LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



Stttji '-.Caiim#% 




UNITED STATES OP AMERICA. 



MAMELONS and Ungava 



^ Ccgcub of tl)e Sagiimay* 



BY 



W. H. H. MURRAY. 







BOSTON : 
DE WOLFE, FISKE & CO 

365 Washington Street. 



\ 



\ 






Copyright, 

DE WOLFE, FISKE & CO., 

1890. 



0^ 



^ 



\ 



^ 



.\ 



To THAT American who knows and loves the Legendary 
Lore of his native land, and appreciates what I would fain 
do for it if I were able ; who, distinguished by the bright- 
ness of his wit, the gentleness of his nature, and his love 
of polite letters, is beloved by all who know him ; to 

(3mQz ^teiuart, Jr., B.CIL., B. Eftt., Jp.E.@.^., 

of Quebec, I inscribe this Tale of Mamelons. 

The Author.. 

Burlington, Vt., 1S90. 



CONTENTS 



CHAPTER 


PAGE 


Argument 


I 


I. The Trail 


7 


II. The Fight at Mamelons . 


. • . 45 


III. The Mother's Message 


. 91 


IV. Love's Victory .... 


. 124 


V. At Mamelons .... 


• 155 



AUTHOR'S PREFACE. 



T HAVE for some years felt that the con- 
nection of the old races with the North 
American Continent, the signs and proofs of 
whose presence are to be found almost every- 
where, and nowhere so frequently as on the 
St. Lawrence, afforded material for entertain- 
ing authorship. Prompted by this feeling, I 
have, during these several years past, been 
working at certain pieces of composition, of 
which this bit of romance is a fair sample. 

If it shall so far please the reading public 
that its publisher shall not lose money by his 
venture — for letters in our time have no 



IV PREFACE. 

patronage save from the hope of selfish 
gain — I shall, later on, print others like to 
it. But if it fail, as it quite likely will, to 
bring him commercial profit, then they will 
be forgotten as this one will, until I better 
them, or they come to a better time. 

W. H. H. MURRAY. 
Burlington, Vt., Jan. 7, 1887. 



NTRODUCTION. 



7\ yi Y publishers have requested me to pre- 
^ ^ pare a brief statement concerning my 
literary work, especially that portion of it 
relating to the character known as John Nor- 
ton the Trapper — and the stories called the 
''Adirondack Tales." They represent that 
there is an unusual curiosity and interest on 
the part of many touching this matter, and 
that a brief statement from me, as the author 
of them, will please many and interest all who 
read my works. 

I know that many thousands of people do 
feel in this way, for my mails for several 



VI INTRODUCTION. 

years have brought me ahnost daily a most 
agreeable correspondence concerning not only 
the character of John Norton the Trapper, 
but the general scope and characteristics 
of my literary work ; and because of this 
personal knowledge I do the more cheer- 
fully comply with my publishers' request, and 
will, now and here, set down as briefly as I 
may what seems likely to be of interest to 
those who read this volume. 

The first volume ever published, of my 
writing, was by the house of Ticknor & Fields, 
in 1868, I think, and had for its title ''Murray's 
Adventures in the Wilderness." This was the 
book which first brought the Adirondacks to 
popular notice, and did so much to advertise 
that now famous region to the sporting and 
touring classes of the country. The notice- 



INTRODUCTION-. vii 

able thing as to this volume is that it was 
not prepared by me for publication, and while 
writing the several chapters I had no idea 
that they, or anything I should ever write, 
would be published. I was then in the cleri- 
cal profession, and was stationed at Meriden, 
Conn. I had at this time a habit of compos- 
ing each day, when my duties permitted me 
the leisure, some bits of writing wholly apart 
from my profession and work. They were of 
the nature of exercises in English composi- 
tion, and had no other interest to me than 
the mental refreshment it gave me to write 
them, and the hope that the doing of them 
would assist me to improve my style in ex- 
pression. They were constructed slowly and 
rewritten many times, until they were as sim- 
ple and accurate as to the use of words as I 



viii INTRODUCTION. 

could make them. I enjoyed the work very 
much, and the composition of those Httle bits 
of description and humor dehghted me prob- 
ably more than they ever have the readers 
of them. By an accident of circumstances 
they were printed in the Me7'iden Recorder, 
and, beyond pleasing a few hundreds of local 
readers, made no reputation for themselves 
whatever. At least, I never heard of them 
or gave them any thought. It was owing to 
James T. Fields that their merit, such as they 
had, was discovered, and that they were given 
in volume form to the world. Of the recep- 
tion the little book met with at the hands of 
the public, I need not speak. As to it I 
know no one was more surprised than I was. 
It made the Adirondacks famous, and gave 
me a nom de flume which has almost over- 



INTRODUCTION, ix 

shadowed the name I was christened with. 
What pleases me most as to it is the thought 
that it helped to introduce healthier fashions 
of recreation, and brought thousands into close 
and happy connection with Nature. 

Of several volumes of sermons that were 
published while I was in the clerical profes- 
sion I make no mention, for I do not regard 
them as literary productions. They represent 
only a temporary popular demand, and as 
compositions only the low average possible 
to an overworked man, compelled by his 
duties to do too much to do anything well. 

The volume known as the " Perfect Horse" 
was, I believe, with the exception of Hiram 
Woodruff's little volume, the first attempt made 
by an American author to teach the breeders 
of the trotting horse in this country the true 



X INTRODUCTION. 

principles and correct methods of equine prop- 
agation. It had a large sale, and, I have rea- 
son to think, helped the country to needed 
knowledge. To me it only stood for years 
of wide and close studentship of the ques- 
tion, and a benevolent endeavor. 

The prompting motive in the preparation 
of '' Daylight Land " was this : The little book 
"Adventures in the Wilderness" was published 
in 1868, I think, and under circumstances such 
as I have explained. I had no thought at 
that time of becoming an author. The several 
chapters of that little volume were written as 
exercises in composition. I was, at the writ- 
ing of them, only some twenty-six years old. 
I knew little of life or nature, and absolutely 
nothing of what literary balance and fitness 
mean. My knowledge of woodcraft was then 



INTRODUCTION. ^i 

slight, of the American Continent slighter yet. 
Naturally the book, because of the fame it 
won, became, as years passed, my knowledae 
grew apace, and my power of expression 
ripened, a regret to me. It did not in any 
sense represent me as an author. This feel- 
ing was shared by others who have regard for 
my writings, especially along the lines of de- 
scription and entertainment ; and I was urged 
to compose a volume of the same general 
character as my first little book, that should 
be a fairer and happier expression of myself 
as an author, in the lighter moods of com- 
position. It may interest some to learn — 
especially young authors and literary folk — 
that " Daylight Land " had for its prompting 
cause the feeling that it was not fit for me 
to be permanently represented in descriptive 



Xll INTRODUCTION. 

writing and in composition of the lighter sort, 
by that little book that has gone so far and 
done so much of good in many ways, but 
which, because of the reasons stated, has al- 
ways been extremely unsatisfactory to me. 

I will now come directly to the character 
of John Norton the Trapper and the ''Adiron- 
dack Tales." 

I was once at a luncheon at which Mr. 
James T. Fields presided. Several clever 
literary men of more or less prominence 
were present. Mr. Emerson was there, and 
in answer to the query, "What makes a story 
a great ^ story," said : "A story which will make 
the average reader laugh and cry both is a 
great story, and he who writes it is a true 
author." The definition struck me, when I 
heard it, as a very proper one ; and it has 



INTRODUCTION. xiii 

influenced me In my choice of subjects and 
methods of treatment ever since. 

Another question discussed at that table 
was this: ''Why must the feminine element 
be Introduced so constandy?" or, as one of 
the witty lunchers phrased It, ''Why must 
every author forever introduce a woman into 
his story ? " 

This was discussed at length, all assuming 
that such necessity did exist. 

I had not engaged In the spirited talk, being; 
well content to listen. This Mr. Fields noted, 
and insisted on "Parson Murray "— as he 
facetiously called me — giving his views. I 
replied that I would sooner keep quiet, espe- 
cially as I did not agree with the verdict of 
the table. This attracted a surprised atten- 
tion, and I was compelled to say " that I did 



xiv IxWTRODUCTION, 

not see the need of introducing a woman into 
every story, and that I believed a story meet- 
ing Mr. Emerson's definition of a great story, 
viz., one which would make the readers of it 
laugh and cry both, could be written without 
a woman appearing in it, and that in some 
masculine natures was a tenderness as deep, 
a sympathy as sweet, and a love as strong 
as existed in woman." And I added, " Mr. 
Emerson has forgotten that in a book with 
which, as he was a clergyman for years, he 
is perfectly familiar, there is a picture given 
of two men who ' loved each other beyond 
the love of women.' " 

Not to dilate further, from that day Mr. 
Fields never ceased to urge me to " attempt 
that story," and, being most friendly to me, — 
and to what young person with any talent 



INTRODUCTION. XV 

was he not ever a friend ? — he would say, 
"• I tell you, Murray, try and see if you can 
write that story, not a woman or the hint of 
one, good or bad, in it ; for it may be you 
might succeed, and if you should, you know 
what Emerson said ; and I would like to 
be the publisher." Prompted by this kindly 
thought for me, and moved by assisting cir- 
cumstances, I wrote the " Story of the Man 
Who Didn't Know Much." It was composed 
amid the pressure of journalistic as well as 
clerical labors, by being dictated to a type- 
writer, and appeared in the weekly issues of 
the Golden Rule, a journal of which I was 
editor and owner. It gave great satisfaction 
to the readers of the paper, and increased 
its circulation appreciably. Of its literary 
merit, if it had any, the readers of the vol- 



XVI INTRODUCTION. 

ume can judge. The pleasantest thought to 
me, perhaps, concerning it, was the fact that 
Mr. Fields came one day to my study, and in 
his genial, earnest way exclaimed, " Murray, 
you have done what you said could be done ; 
you have written a story up to the level of 
Emerson's definition, for I have read it from 
beginning to end, and laughed and cried over 
it both." It is doubtless owing to this story 
and the success of it, more than to any other 
cause, that my mind was turned toward liter- 
ature as the field in which I could work with 
the greatest pleasure to myself, and perhaps 
with the largest resultant benefit to mankind. 
The character of the Lad was sketched with 
the desire to illustrate the beauty and moral 
force of innocence and simplicity, as con- 
trasted with great mental endowments. It 



INTRODUCTION. xvii 

was from listening to the playing of the great- 
est master of the violin in modern times, Ole 
Bull, that I conceived the description of the 
Lad's violin and his manner of playing it 
at the ball. The great violinist expressed to 
me the delight the reading of the passage 
gave him, and jokingly declared that he en- 
joyed it all the more because it was composed 
by a man who couldn't play a note himself! 

Of John Norton — and this must stand as 
answer to all the Interrogations that have 
been put to me concerning him — I have 
this to say. I never saw any such man as 
John Norton ; never saw one so good as he 
is, In my vision of him ; never saw one who 
even suggested him. He is a creation, pure 
and simple, of my imagination. But, though 
I never saw such a man, he nevertheless 



xviii IN TROD UCTION. 

Stands for an actual type. Big-bodied, big- 
headed, big-hearted, wise, humorous, humane, 
brave, he types to me the old-fashioned New 
England man, who, having lived his life in 
the woods, has had developed in him those 
virtues and qualities of head and heart, of 
mind and soul, in harmony with his life-long 
surroundings. Through him, as my mouth- 
piece, I tell whatever of knowledge I have 
of woodcraft, whatever appreciation I have of 
Nature, and whatever wisdom I may have 
been taught by my communings with her si- 
lence. This is all I know of John Norton 
the Trapper. The " Story that the Keg told 
me " was composed simply to introduce the 
character of John Norton to the reader, to 
present him, as it were, to the reader's eye, and 
]v-epare him to appreciate his characteristics. 



INTRODUCTION. XIX 

The '' Adirondack Tales," as outlined in my 
mind, consist of six volumes, three of which 
are already written and await publication, the 
other three I hope to complete within the 
next five or six years. The Canadian Idyls 
will consist also of six volumes, the " Doom 
of Mamelons," " Ungava," and '' Mistassinni " 
being the first three. In them I treat of the 
myths and traditions of the aboriginal races 
of America as located especially in the north- 
ern section of the continent, and they repre- 
sent my best effort. It is not likely that 
much, if indeed any part, of what I may 
write will be granted a permanent place in 
the literature of my country, nor am I stirred 
to effort by any ambition or dream that it 
may. I shall be well satisfied if, by what I 
write, some present entertainment be afforded 



XX INTRODUCTION, 

the reader : a love of nature inculcated ; and 
encouragement given to a more manly or 
womanly life. As my expectation is modest, 
I am the more likely, perhaps, to live long 
enough to see some small part of it, at least, 

realized. 

W. H. H. MURRAY. 
Burlington, Vt. 



ARGUMENT. 



'T^HE development of the story turns upon 
the working of an old Indian prophecy 
or tradition, which had been in the Lenni- 
Lenape tribe, to the effect, that when an 
intermarriage between a princess of their 
tribe and a white man should occur, it would 
bring ruin to the tribe, and cause it to be- 
come extinct at Mamelons. For it was at the 
mouth of the Saguenay, as they held, that 
the whites first landed on this western conti- 
nent. This intermarriage, or '* cross of red 
with white," had occurred, and the time had 
nearly come when the last of the race 



2 ARGUMENT. 

should, in accordance with the old prophecy, 
die at Mamelons. 

The persons introduced into this tale are 
John Norton, the Trapper, who is comrade 
and bosom friend of the chief of the Lenni- 
Lenape ; the chief himself, who is dying from 
an old wound received in a fight at Mame- 
lons, and has sent a runner to summon the 
Trapper to his bedside, to receive his dying 
message ; a very beautiful woman of that 
most peculiar and ancient of all known peo- 
ples, the Basques of Southern Spain, the 
last of their queenly line, who has been mar- 
ried in France by the chief's brother, and 
to whom a daughter has been born, Atla, the 
beautiful heroine of the story. And, in addi- 
tion to these, is an old chief of the famous 
Mistassinni tribe, who had had his tongue cut 



ARGUMENT. 3 

out at the torture stake by the Esquimaux, 
from whose fury he had been rescued by a 
party of warriors, headed by the Trapper. 

At Mamelons in a great fight, fought in 
the darkness and terror of an earthquake 
commotion, the chief of the Lenni-Lenape 
had, unknowingly, slain his brother, who, 
returning from France with his young Basque 
wife, had been wrecked on the coast of 
Labrador, and, out of gratitude to the Esqui- 
maux, who had treated him kindly, he joined 
their ranks as they marched up to Mamelons 
to the great battle. Thus, fighting as foes, 
unknown to each other, in the darkness that 
enveloped the field, he was killed by his 
brother, having seriously wounded him in 
return. 

The Basque princess, thus widowed by the 



4 ARGUMENT. 

untimely death of her young husband, gave 
birth to Atla, who was thus born an orphan, 
and under doom herself. Her mother, soon 
after the birth of Atla, was rescued from 
death by the Trapper, and loved him with 
all the ardor of her fervent nature. His 
affections she strove and hoped to win, and 
would, perhaps, have succeeded, had not 
death claimed her. Dying, she left her love 
and hopes as an heritage to her daughter, 
and charged her, with solemn tenderness, to 
win the Trapper's affection, and, married to 
him, become the mother of a mighty race, 
in whose blood the beauty and strength of 
the two oldest and handsomest races of the 
earth should be happily mingled. 

The chief, knowing of her wish, and the 
instructions left to Atla by her departed 



ARGUMENT. 5 

mother, summons the Trapper to his death- 
bed, to tell him the origin of the doom, and 
the possibility or surety of its being avoided 
by his loving and marrying Atla. For, by 
the conditions of the old curse it was pro- 
claimed when spoken, that the '' doom shall 
not hold in case of son born in the female 
line from sire without a cross," viz. : — from a 
pure-blooded white man. The Trapper in his 
humility feels himself to be unworthy of so 
splendid an alliance, and resists the natural 
promptings of his heart. 

But at last the beautiful Atla wins him to 
a full confession ; and at her urgent request, 
against the Trapper's wish, they start for 
Mamelons to be married, where, before the 
rite is concluded, she dies, so fulfilling the 
old prediction of her father's tribe. 



6 ARGUMENT. 

In the Basque princess, the mother of 
Atla, the author has striven to portray an 
utterly unconventional woman, natural, bar- 
baric, original; splendid in her beauty, and 
glorious in her passions, such as actually 
lived in the world in the far past, when 
women were — it must be confessed — totally 
unlike the prevalent type of to-day. In her 
child, Atla, the same type of natural woman- 
hood is preserved, but slightly sobered in 
tone and shade of expression. But as studies 
of the beautiful and the unconventional in 
womanhood, both are unique and delightful. 

Note. — The notes which have been connected in 
explanation of certain passages of the story, are so 
pecuHarly interesting and suggestive that they make the 
reader wish that the author had extended them in 
fuller exposition of that " lore of woods and waters 
and of antique days " with which he is so familiar. 

Publishers. 



MAMELONS.^ 

A LEGEND CTF THE SAGUENAY. 



CHAPTER I. 



THE TRAIL. 



TT was a long and lonely trail, the southern 
end of which John Norton struck in answer 
to the summons which a tired runner brought 
him from the north. The man had made brave 
running, for when he reached the Trapper's 
cabin and had placed the birch-bark packet 
in his hands, he staggered to a pile of skins 

^ Mamelons. The Indians' name for the mouth of the 
Saguenay, and signifies the Place of the Great Mounds. 
See note 12. 



8 MAMELONS. 

and dropped heavily on them, Hke a hound 
which, from a three-days' chase, trails weakly 
to the hunter's door, spent nigh to death. So 
came the runner, running from the north, and 
so, spent with his mighty race, dropped as 
one dead upon the pile of skins. 

He bore the death-call of a friend, whose 
friendship had been tested on many an am- 
bushed trail and the sharp edge of dubious 
battle. The call was writ on bark of birch, 
thin as the thinnest silk the ancients wove 
from gossamer in the old days when weaving 
was an art and mystery, and not a sordid 
trade to earn a pittance with, traced in deli- 
cate letters by a hand the Trapper would have 
died for. A good five hundred miles that 
trail ran northward before it ended at the 
couch of skins, in the great room of the 



MAMELOXS. Q 

great house, in which the chief lay dyino-. 
And when the Trapper struck it he struck 
it as an eagle strikes homeward toward the 
cradle crag of his )-ounglings, when talons 
are heavy and daylight scant. He drew his 
line by the star that never sets, and little 
turning did he make for rivers, rapids, or 
tangled swamp ; for mountain slope or briery 
windfall. He drew a trail no man had ever 
trod — a blazeless' trail, unmarked by stroke 

^ In order to mark the direction of his course iri 
trailing through the woods the trailer slashes with his 
axe or knife the bark of the trees he passes, by which 
signs he is able to retrace his course safely, or follow the 
same trail easily some future time. A blazed trail is 
one thus plainly marked. A blazeless trail is one on 
which the trailer has no marks or "blazes" to run by, 
but draws his line by other and occult signs, which tell 
him in what direction he is going and which are known 
only by those initiated in the mysteries of woodcraft. 



lO MAMELONS. 

of axe or cut of knife, by broken twig or 
sharpened rod, struck into mold or moss, and 
by its angle ' telling whence came the trailer, 
whither went he, and how fast. From earli- 
est dawn till night thickened the woods and 
massed the trees into a solid blackness, he 
hurried on, straight as a pigeon flies when 
homing, studying no sign for guidance, leav- 
ing none to tell that he had come and gone. 
He was at middle prime of life, tough and 
pliant as an ashen bough grown on hill, sea- 
soned in hall, sweated and strung by constant 
exercise for highest action, and now each mus- 

^ Certain tribes of Indians north of the St. Lawrence 
left accurate record of their rate of progress, and how 
far they had come, by the length and angle of the 
slanted sticks they drove here and there into the 
ground as they sped on. The Nasquapees were best 
known as practicing this habit. 



MAMELONS. \ \ 

cle and sinew of his superb and superbly con- 
ditioned frame was taut with tension of a 
strone desire — to reach the bedside of the 
dying chief before he died. For the message 
read : " Come to me quick, for I am alone 
with the terror of death. The chief is dying. 
At the pillar of white rock, on the lake, a 
canoe, with oars and paddle, will be waiting." 
The Trapper was clad in buckskin from cap 
to moccasins. His tunic, belted tight and 
fringeless, was opened widely at the throat for 
freest breathing. A pack, small, but rounded 
with strained fullness, was at his back. His 
horn and pouch were knotted to his side. 
In tightened belt was knife, and, trailing 
muzzle down and held reversed, a double 
rifle. Stripped was the man for speed, as 
when balanced on the issue of the race hang 



12 MAMELONS. 

life and death. As some great ship, caught 
by some sudden gale off Anticosti or Dead 
Man's Reef, and bare of sail, stripped to her 
spars, past battures hollow and hoarse-voiced 
as death and ghastly white, and through the 
damned eddies that would suck her down and 
crush her with stones which grind forever 
and never see the light, sharpening their 
cuttings with their horrid grists, runs scud- 
ding ; so ran the strong man northward, 
urged by a fear stronger than that of wreck 
on the ghost-peopled shore of deadly St. 
Lawrence. A hound, huge of size, bred to 
a hair, ambled steadily on at heel. And 
though he crossed many a hot scent, and 
more than once his hurrying master started 
a buck warm from his nest, and nose was 
busy with knowledge of game afoot, he gave 



MA MELONS. 1 3 

no whimper nor swerved aside, but, silent, 
followed on in the swift way his master was 
so hurriedly making, as if he, too, felt the 
solemn need which urged the trail north- 
ward. Never before had runner faced a 
longer or a harder trail, or under high com- 
mand or deadly peril pushed it so fiercely 
forward. 

Seven days the trail ran thus, and still the 
man, tireless of foot, hurried on, and the hound 
followed silently at heel. What a body was 
his ! How its powers responded to the soul's 
summons ! For on this seventh day of high- 
est effort, taxing with heavy strain each muscle, 
bone, and joint to the utmost, days lengthened 
from earliest dawn to deepest gloaming, the 
strong man's face was fresh, his eye was 
bright, and he swung steadily onward, with 



14 MA MELONS. 

long, swinging, easy-motioned gait, as if the 
prolonged and terrible effort he was making 
was but a morning's burst of speed for healthy 
exercise. 

The climate favored him. October, with all 
its crlorious colors, was on the woods, and the 
warm body of the air was charged through 
and through with cool atmospheric movements 
from the north. It was an air to race for 
one's life in. Soft to the lungs, but filled 
to its blue edge with oxygen and that mystic 
element men call ozone ; the overflow of God's 
vitality spilled over the azure brim of heaven, 
whose volatile flavor fills the nose of him who 
breathes the air of mountains. Favored thus 
by rare conditions, the best that nature gives 
the trailer, the strong man raced onward 
through the ripe woods like an old-time run- 



MAMELOiXS. 15 

ner running for the laurel crown and the 
applause of Greece. 

It was nigh sunset of the seventh day, and 
the Trapper halted beside a spring, which 
bubbled coldly up from a cleft rock at the 
base of a cliff. He cast aside his hunting 
shirt, baring his body to the waist, and bathed 
himself in the cool water. He knelt to its 
mossy rim and sank his head slowly down 
into the refreshing depths, and held it there, 
that he might feel the delicious coolness run 
thrilling through his heated body. He cast 
his moccasins aside and bathed his feet, sore 
and hot from monstrous effort, sinkinor them 
knee deep in the cold flowage of the blessed 
spring. Then, refreshed, he stood upon the 
velvet bank, his mighty chest and back pink 
as a lady's palm, his strong feet glowing, his 



1 6 MA MELONS. 

face aflush through its deep tan, while the 
wind dried him, and the golden leaves of the 
overhanging maples fell round him in showers. 

Refreshed and strengthened, he reclothed 
himself, relaced his moccasins and tiorhtened 
belt, but before he broke away he drew the 
sheet of birch-bark from his breast and read 
again the lines traced delicately thereon. 

" Yes, I read aright," he muttered to him- 
self; "the writing on the birch is plain as 
ivy on the oak, and it says : ' Come to me 
quick, for I am alone with the terror of death. 
The chief lies dying. At the pillar of white 
rock, on the lake, a canoe, with oars and pad- 
dle, will be waiting.' " And the Trapper thrust 
the writing back to its place above his heart 
and burst away down the decline that led to 
the lake at a run. 



MA MELONS. 1 7 

'' I've bent the trail like a fool," he mut- 
tered, as he reached the bottom of the dip, 
*' or the lake lies hereaway," and even as 
he spoke the waters of a lake, red with 
the red flame of the setting sun, gleamed 
like a field of fire through the maple-trees. 
The Trapper dashed a hand into the air with 
a gesture of delight, and burst away again at 
a lope through the russet bushes and golden 
leaves that lay like plucked plumage, ankle 
deep, upon the ground toward the lake, 
burning redly through the trees not fifty 
rods beyond. A moment brought him to the 
shore, bordered thick with cedar growths, 
and, breaking throus^h the fragrant branches 
with a leap, he landed on a beach of silver 
sand, and lo ! to the left, not a dozen rods 
away, washed by the red waves, stood the 



1 8 MA MELONS. 

signal rock, fifty feet in height, and from 
water Hne to summit white as drifted snow. 

" God be praised ! " exclaimed the Trapper, 
and he lifted his cap reverently. " God be 
praised that I reckoned the course aright and 
ran the trail straight from end to end. For 
the woods be wide and long, and to have 
missed this lake would have been a sorry hap 
when one like her is alone with the dying. 
But where is the canoe that she said should 
be here, for sixty miles of water cannot be 
jumped like a brook or forded like a rapid, 
and the island lies nigh the western shore, 
and who may reach it afoot ? " And he ran 
his eyes along the sand for signs to tell if 
boat or human foot had pressed it. 

He searched the beach a mile around the 
bay, but not a sign of human presence could 



MA MELONS. . 1 9 

be found. Then niorh the slornal rock he sat 

o o 

upon the sand, unloosed his pack, and from 
it took crust and meat, of which he ate, then 
fed the hound, sharing the scant supper with 
him equally. "It is the last morsel. Rover," 
said the Trapper to the dog as he fed him. 
''It is the last morsel in the pack, and you 
and I will breakfast lightly unless luck 
comes." The dog surely understood the mas- 
ter's saying, for he rolled his hungry eyes 
toward the pack as if he bitterly sensed the 
bitter prophecy ; then — canine philosopher 
as he was — he curled himself amid some 
dried leaves contentedly, as if by extra sleep 
he would make good the lack of food. 

" Thou art wiser than men ! " exclaimed 
the Trapper, looking reflectively at his canine 
companion, now snoring in his warm russet 



20 Af A MELONS. 

bed. "Thou art wiser, my dog, than men, 
for they waste breath and time in bewailing 
their hard fortunes, but you make good the 
loss that pinches thee by holding fast and 
quickly to the nearest gain." And he gazed 
upon the sleeping hound with reflecting and 
admiring eyes. 

Then slowly behind the western hills sank 
the red sun. The fervor faded from the 
water and the lake darkened. The winds 
died with the day. Gradually the farther 
shore retired from sight, and the distinguish- 
ing hills became blankly black. The upper 
air held on to the retreating light awhile, but 
finally surrendered the last trace, and night 
held all the world. 

Amid the gathering gloom upon the beach 
the Trapper sat in counsel with his thoughts. 



MA MELONS. 21 

At length he rose, and with dry driftage 
within reach kindled a fire. By the light of 
it he cut some branches of nigh cedars, and 
with them made a bed upon the sand, then 
cast himself upon his fragrant couch. Twice 
he rose and listened. Twice renewed the 
fire with larger sticks. At last, tired nature 
failed the will. The toil of the long trail 
fell heavily on him. Slumber captured his 
senses and he slept the sleep of sheer ex- 
haustion. But before he slept he muttered 
to himself: 

*' She said a canoe, with oars and paddle, 
should be here, and the canoe will come." 

The hours passed on. The Dipper turned 
its circle in the northern sky, and stars rose 
and set. The warm shores felt the coolness 
of the nio-ht, and from the water's edo-e a soft 



2:> MAMELONS. 

mist flowed and floated in thin layers along 
the cooling sands. The logs of seasoned 
wood glowed with a steady warmth in the 
calm air. The fog turned yellow as it drifted 
above the burning brands, so that a halo 
crowned the ruddy heat. The night was at 
its middle watch, when the hound rose to 
his feet and questioned the lake with lifted 
nose, but his mouth gave no signal. If one 
was comincT, it was the comino- of a friend. 
Ten minutes passed, then he whined softly, 
and, walking to the water's edge, waited ex- 
pectant ; not long, for in a moment a canoe, 
moving silently, as if wind-blown, came float- 
ing toward the beach, and lodged upon it 
noiselessly, as bird on bough. And a girl, 
paddle in hand, stepped to his side, and, 
stooping, caressed his head, then moved to- 



MAMELONS. ^X 

ward the fire and stood above the sleeping 



man. 



She gently stirred the brands until they 
flamed, and in the light thus made studied 
the strong face, bronzed with the tan of the 
woods, the face of one who never failed friend 
nor fought foe in vain, and who had come so 
far and swifdy in answer to her call. She was 
of that old race who lived in the mornino- of 
the world, when giants walked the earth' and 
the sons of God married the daughters of 
men.^ And the old blood's love of streno-th 
was in her. She noted the power and sym- 
metry of his mighty frame, which lay relaxed 

1 "There were giants in the earth in those days." — 
Gen. vi. 4. 

The sons of God saw the daughters of men that they 
were fair, and they took them wives of all which they 
chose." — Gen. vi. 2. 



24 MAMELONS. 

from tension in the graceful attitude of sleep ; 
the massive chest, broad as two common 
men's, which rose and fell to his deep breath- 
ing ; the great, strongly corded neck, rooted 
to the vast trunk as some huge oak grown 
on a rounded hill. She noted, too, the large 
and shapely head, the thick, black hair, closely 
cropped, and the sleeper's face — where might 
woman find another like it ? — lean of flesh, 
large featured, plain, but stamped with the 
seal of honesty, chiseled clean of surplus by 
noble abstinence, and bearing on its front the 
look of pride, of power and courage to face 
foe or fate. Thus the eirl sat and watched 
him as he slept, stirring the brands softly that 
she mieht not lose sio-ht of a face which was 
to her the face of a god — such god as the 
proudest woman of her race, in the old time 



MAMELONS. 25 

might, with art or goodness, have won and 
wedded. 

Dawn came at last. The blue above turned 
gray. The stars shortened their pointed fires 
and faded. The east kindled and fiamed. 
Heat flowed westward like an essential oil 
hidden in the pores and channels of the air ; 
while light, brightly clean and clear, ran round 
the horizons, revealing its own and the love- 
liness of the world. 

Then woke the birds. Morning found a 
voice sweet as her face. A hermit thrush 
sent her soft, pure call from the damp depths 
of the dripping woods. A woodpecker sig- 
nalled breakfast with his hammer so sturdily 
that all the elfin echoes of the hills merrily 
mimicked him. An eagle, hunting through the 
sky, at the height of a mile, dropped like a 



26 MAMELONS. 

plummet into the lake, and, struggling up- 
ward from his perilous plunge, heavily 
weighted, lined his slow flight straight toward 
his distant crag. The girl rose to her feet, 
and, leaning on her paddle, for a moment 
gazed long and tenderly at the sleeper's face, 
then softly breathed, *'John Norton!" 

The call, low as it was, broke through the 
leaden e^tes of slumber with the suddenness 
and effect of a great surprise. Quick as a 
flash he came to his feet, and, for a moment, 
stood dazed, bewildered, his bodily powers 
breaking out of sleep quicker than his senses, 
and he saw the girl as visitant in vision. He 
stepped to the water's edge and bathed his 
face, and turning, freshened and fully awake, 
saw Avith glad and apprehensive eyes, who 
stood before him, and tenderly said: 



MAMELONS. 27 

* Is the daughter of the old race well ? " 
'' Well, well, I am, John Norton," answered 
the girl, and her voice was low and softly 
musical, as water falling into water. " I am 
well, friend of my mother and my friend. 
And the chief still lives and will live till you 
come, for so he bade me tell you." And she 
reached her small hand out to him. He took 
it in his own, and held it as one holds the 
hand of child, and answered : 

" I am glad. Thou comest like a bird In 
the night, silently. Why did you not awake 
me when you came ? " • 

*' Why should I wake thee, John Norton?" 
returned the girl. " I am a day ahead of that 
the chief set for your coming. For our run- 
ner — the swiftest In the woods from Mlstas- 
slnnl to Labrador — said: 'Twelve suns must 



28 MAMELONS. 

rise and set before my words could reach 
thee,' and the chief declared : ' No living man, 
not even you, could fetch the trail short of 
ten days.' He timed me to this rock him- 
self, and told me when I would come nor 
wait another hour, that I would wait by the 
white rock two days before I saw your face. 
But I would come, for a voice within me 
said — a voice which runs vocal in our blood, 
and has so run through all my race since 
the beginning of the world — this voice with- 
in kept saying : ' Go, for thou shalt firid 
him there!' And so I, hurrying, came. But 
tell me how many days were you upon the 
trail ? " 

** I fetched the trail in seven days from 
sun to sun," answered the Trapper, modestly. 

'* Seven days ! " exclaimed the girl, while 



MAMELONS. 29 

the light of a great surprise and admiration 
shone in her eyes. " Seven days ! Thou hast 
the deer's foot and the cougar's strength, John 
Norton. No wonder that the war chiefs love 
you. 

And then after a moment's pause : 

'' But why didst thou push the trail so 
fiercely ? " 

'* I read your summons and I came," replied 
the Trapper, sententiously. 

The girl started at the hearing of the 
words, which told her so simply of her power 
over the man in front of her. Her nostrils 
dilated, and through the glorious swarth of 
her cheek there came a flush of deeper red. 
The gloom of her eyes moistened like glass 
to the breath. Her ripe lips parted as to 
the passing of a gasp, and the full form lifted 



30 MAMELONS. 

as if the spirit of passion within would fling 
the beautiful frame it filled upon the strong 
man's bosom. Thus a moment the sweet 
whirlwind seized and shook her, then passed. 
Her eyes drooped modestly, and with a sweet 
humbleness, as one who has received from 
heaven beyond her hope or merit, she simply 
said : 

" I have brought you food, John Norton. 
Come and eat." 

The food was of the woods. Bread coarse 
and brown, but sweet with the full cereal 
sweetness ; corn, parched in the fire, which 
eaten, lincrered lono- as a rich flavor in the 
mouth ; venison, roasted for a hunter's hun- 
ger, within whose crisp surface the life of 
the deer still showed redly ; water from the 

lake, drunk from a cup shaped from the inner 



MAMELONS. 3 1 

bark of the golden birch, whose hollow cur- 
vature still burned with warm chrome colors. 
So, on the cool lake shore, in the red light 
of early morn, they broke their fast. 

The Trapper ate as a strong man eats 
after long toil and scant feeding, not grossly, 
but with a heartiness good to see. The girl 
ate little, and that absently, as if the atoms 
in her mouth were foreign to her senses and 
no taste followed eating. 

*'You do not eat," said the Trapper. "The 
sun will darken on the lower hills before we 
come to food again. Are you not hungry ? " 

" Last night I was ahungered," answered 
the girl, musingly. ** But now I hunger no 
more," and her face was as the face of a 
Madonna holding her child, full of a plenti- 
ful and sweet content, 



32 MA MELONS. 

"I do not understand you," returned the 
Trapper, after a moment's silence. " Your 
words be plain, but their sense is hidden. 
Why are you not hungry ? " 

*' You read me once out of your sacred 
books, John Norton, that man does not live 
by bread alone, but by every word that pro- 
ceedeth out of the mouth," responded the 
girl. *' I knew not then the meaning of the 
words, for I was a girl, and had no under- 
standing, and the words were old, older than 
your books, and therefore deeply wise, and 
I, being young, did not know. But I know 
now." And here the girl paused a moment, 
hesitated as a young bird to leave the sure 
bough for the first time, then, rallying cour- 
age for the deed, gazed with her large eyes 
lovingly into his, and timidly explained : — 



MAMELONS. 33 

*' I am not hungry John Norton, for God 
has fed me ! " 

To the tanned cheek of the Trapper there 
rushed a glow hke the flush to a face of a 
girl. The Hght of a happy astonishment 
leaped from his eyes, and his breath came 
strongly. Then light and color faded, and 
as one vexed and heartily ashamed of his 
vanity, while the lines of his face tightened, 
he made harsh answer : 

"Talk no more in riddles, fest I be a fool 
and read the riddle awry. Nor jest again on 
matters grave as life, lest I, who am but 
mortal man and slow withal, forget wisdom 
and take thy girlish playfulness for earnest 
talk. Nay, nay," he added earnestly, as she 
rose to her feet with an exclamation of pas- 
sionate pain, '' Say not another word, you 



34 MAMELONS. 

have done no ill. You be young and fanci- 
ful, and I — I be a fool! Come, let us go. 
The pull is long, and we shall need the full 
day's light to reach the island ere night 
falls." And, placing his rifle in the canoe, 
he sio-naled to the hound and seated him- 
self at the oars. The girl obeyed his word, 
stepped to her place and pushed the light 
boat from the sands on which so much had 
been received and so much missed. Per- 
haps her v/oman's heart foretold that love 
like hers would get, even as it gave, all at 
last. 

The house was large and lofty, builded of 
logs squared smoothly and mortared neatly 
between the edges. In the thick walls were 
deep embrasures, that light through the great 



MAMELONS. ^c 

windows might be more abundant. The 
builders loved the sun and made wide path- 
ways for its entrance everywhere. The case- 
ments, fashioned to receive storm shutters, 
were proof against winter's wind and lead 
alike. In the steep roof were dormer win- 
dows, glassed with panes, tighdy soldered to 
the sash. At either end of the great house 
a huge chimney rose, whose solid masonry of 
stone stood boldly out from the hewn loo-s 
framed closely against its mortared sides. A 
wide veranda ran the entire length of the 
southern side. A balustrade of cedar loo-s 
each hewn until it showed its red and fra- 
grant heart, ran completely round it. Above 
posts of the same sweetly odored wood — 
whose fragrance, with its substance, lasts for- 
ever --was lattice-work of poles stripped of 



36 MA MELONS. 

their birchen bark, and snowy white, on 
which a huge vine ran its brow^n tracery, 
enriched with bunches, heavily pendent, of 
blue-black grapes — that pungent growth of 
northern woods, w^hose odors make the wind- 
ing rivers sweet as heaven. In front, a nat- 
ural lawn sloped to the yellow sands, on 
which the weaves fell with soft sound. 

Eastward, a widely acred field showed care- 
ful husbandry. Garnet and yellow colored 
pods hung gracefully from the brown poles. 
The ripened corn showed golden through 
the parted husks, and beds of red and yel- 
low beets patched the dark soil with their 
hieh colors. The solar flower turned its 
broad disk toward the wheeling sun, while 
dahlias, marigold, and hardy annuals, with 
their bright colors, warmed like a floral camp- 



MA MELONS. 37 

fire the stretch of gray stubble and pale bar- 
ren beyond. It was a lovely and a lonely 
spot, graced by a lordly home, such as the 
wealthy worthies builded here and there in 
the great wilderness for comfort and for 
safety in the old savage days when feudal 
lords ' made good their claim to forest seign- 
iories with sword and musket, and every 
house was home and castle. 

The canoe ran lightly shoreward. The 
beach received its pressure as a mother's 
bosom receives the child runninor from afar 
to its reception — yieldingly ; and on the 

^ If the reader will recall that old Canada, viz., the 
Province of Quebec, was wholly French in origin, and 
that its organization rested on the feudal basis, the 
whole territory occupied being divided not into towns 
and counties, but into seigniories. 



38 MA MELONS. 

welcominor sand the licrht bark rested. The 

o o 

Trapper stepped ashore and reached his 
hand back to the girl. Her velvet palm 
touched his, rough and strong, as thistle- 
down, wind blown, the oak tree's bark, then 
nestled and stayed. Thus the two stood 
hand in hand, gazing up the sloping lawn 
at the great house, the broad, bright field 
and the circline forest, elowincr with autum- 
nal colors, which made the glorious back- 
ground. The green lawn, the great gray 
house, and the vast woods belting it around, 
brightly beautiful, made such a landscape pic- 
ture as Titian would have reveled in. It 
stood, this mansion of the woods, this wil- 
derness castle, in glorious loneliness, a part 
and centre of a splendid solitude, beyond 
the coming and going of men, beyond their 



MAMELONS. 39 

wars and peace, the creation and embodi- 
ment of a mystery deep as the woods around 
it ; a strange, astounding spectacle to one 
who did not know the history of the forest. 

'* It is a noble place," exclaimed the Trap- 
per, as he gazed up the wide lawn at the 
great house, and swept with admiring glance 
the glorious circle of the woods which curved 
their belt of splendor round it ; "it is a 
noble place, and if mortal man might find 
content on earth, he might find it here." 

*' Could you, John Norton, living here, be 
content ? " inquired the girl, and she lifted the 
splendor of her eyes to his strong, honest 
face. 

*' Content," returned the Trapper, inno- 
cently, "why, what more could mortal crave 
than is here to his hand ? A field to give 



40 MA MELONS. 

him bread, a noble house to Hve In, the 
waters full of fish, the woods of game, the 
sugar of the maple for his sweetening, honey 
for his feasts, and not a trap within two hun- 
dred miles. What more could mortal man, 
of good judgment, crave ? " 

'* Is there nothing else, John Norton ? " 
asked the eirl. 

"Aye, aye," returned the Trapper, ''one 
thing. I did forget the dog. A hunter 
should have his hound." 

A shade of pain, perhaps vexation, came 
to her face as she heard the Trapper's 
answer. She withdrew her hand from his 
and said : " Food, fur, and a house are not 
enough, John Norton. A dog Is good for 
camp and trail. Solitude Is sweet and the 
absence of wicked men a boon. But these 



MA MELONS. 4 1 

do not make home nor heaven, both of 
which we crave and both of which are pos- 
sible on earth, for the conditions are possi- 
ble. The chief has found this spot a dreary 
place since mother died." 

" Your mother was an angel," answered 
the Trapper, '* and your words are those of 
wisdom. I have thoueht at times of the 
things you hint at, and, as a boy, I had vain 
dreams, for nature is nature. But I have my 
ideas of woman and I love perfect things. 
And I — I am but a hunter, an unlearned 
man, without education, or house, or land, 
or gold, and I am not fit for any woman 
that is fit for me ! " 

The change that came to the girl's face 
at the Trapper's words — for he had spoken 
gravely, and through the honesty of his 



42 MAMELONS. 

Speech she looked and saw the greatness 
and humiHty of his nature — was one to be 
to him who saw it a memory forever. The 
shadow left it and its dusky splendor was 
lighted with the glow of a blessed assur- 
ance. This man would love her ! This man 
widi the eagle's eye, the deer's foot, the 
cougar's strength, the honest heart, would 
love her ! This man her mother reverenced, 
her uncle loved, who twice had saved her 
life at the risk of his, whose skill and cour- 
age were the talk of a thousand camps, 
whose simple word in pledge held faster 
than other's oaths — this man into whose 
very bosom her soul had looked as into a 
clean place — this man would love her! If 
heaven be what good men say, and all its 
bliss had been pledged to her when she lay 



MAMELONS. 43 

dying-, her body would not have thrilled 
with a warmer glow than rushed its sweet 
heat throuo-h her veins at that instant of 
blessed conviction. Wait ! She could wait 
for years, but she would win him — win him 
to herself; win him from his blindness, which 
did him honor, to that dazzlinor Ho-ht in 
whose glory man stands but once ; but, 
standing so, sees, with a glad bewilderment, 
that the woman he dares not love, because 
she is so infinitely better than he, loves 
him! Yes, she would win him — win him 
with such sweet art, such patient approaches, 
such seductiveness of innocent passion, slowly 
and deliciously disclosed, that he should never 
know of his temerity until, thus drawn to 
her, she held him in her arms irrevocably, 
in bonds that only cold and hateful death 



44 MA MELONS. 

could part. Through all her leaping blood 
diis blessed hope, this sure, sweet knowl- 
edge flowed like spiced wine. This man, 
this man she worshipped, he would love 
her ! It was enough. Her cup ran full to 
the brim and overflowed. She simply took 
the Trapper's hand again and said : 

''We will go to the chamber of the chief. 
His eyes will brighten when he sees thy 
face." • 



CHAPTER II. 

THE FIGHT AT MAMELONS.' 

'' IT was a dreadful fight, John Norton. We 
went into It a thousand warriors on a 
side, and in either army were twenty chiefs 
of fame. We fought the fiorht at Mamelons, 
where, at sunset, we met the Esquimaux,^ 
coming up as we were going down. The 
Montaignais headed the war. The Moun- 

^ This old battle-ground is located on the high ter- 
races which define the several sand mounds now stand- 
ing back of Tadousac. 

^ The Esquimaux were numerous and very warlike, 

and at one time had pushed their conquests clean up to 

the Saguenay. 

45 



46 MAMELONS. 

taineers/ whose fathers' wigwams stood at 
Mamelons, had fought the Esquimaux a thou- 
sand years, and both had wrongs to right. 
My father died that summer, and I, fresh 
from the fields of France, headed my tribe. 
You know how small it was, the last rem- 
nant of the old Lenape root, but every man 
a warrior. I knew not the right or wrong 
of it, nor did I care. I only knew our tribe 
was pledged to the Nasquapees^ of frozen 

^ The Montaignais Indians held the country, from 
Quebec down to the Esquimaux, near Seven Islands, 
and called themselves " Mountaineers." 

^ The Nasquapees are one of the most remarkable 
families of Indians on the continent, and of whom but 
little is known. Their country extends from Lake Mis- 
tassinni eastward to Labrador, and from Ungava Bay to 
the coast mountains of the St. Lawrence. They are 
small in size, fine featured, with mild, dark eyes, and 



MAMELOAS. 47 

Ungava, and they were allies of the Moun- 
taineers, and hence the fight held us to its 
edge. That night we slept under truce, but 
when the sun came up went at it. I see 
that morninor now. The sun from out the 
eastern sea rose red as blood. The Nasqua- 
pees, who lived as atheists without a Medi- 
cine man, cared not for this, but the prophet 
of the Mountaineers painted his face and body 

extremely small hands and feet. The name Nasquapees 
— Nasqupics — means " a people who stand straight." 
They have no Medicine man or Prophet, and hence are 
called by other tribes atheists. Their sense of smell 
is so acute that it rivals the dog's. " Spirit rappings," 
and other strange manifestations peculiar to us moderns, 
have been practised immemorially among them, and car- 
ried to such a shade of success that one of our Boston 
seances would be a laughable and bungling affair to 
them. Their language is like the Western Crees, and 
their traditions point to a remote eastern origin. 



48 MAxMELONS. 

black as night, tore his blanket into shreds, 
and lay in the sand as one dead. The Nas- 
quapees laughed, but we of the mountains 
knew by that dread sign that our faces looked 
toward our last battle. We made it a brave 
doom. We fought till noon upon the shift- 
ing sands, nor gained an inch, nor did our 
foes, when suddenly the sun was clouded and 
a great wind arose that drove the sand so 
thickly that it hid the battle. The firing and 
the shouting ceased along the terrace where 
we fought, and a great, dread silence fell on 
the mighty mounds, save when the fierce 
gusts smote them. Thus, living and dead, 
friend and foe, we lay together, our faces 
plunged into the coarse gravel, our hands 
clutching the rounded stones, that we might 
breathe and stay until the wind might pass. 



MAMELONS. 49 

And such a wind was never blown on man 
before, for it was hot and came straight down 
from heaven, so that our backs winced as we 
lay flattened. Thus, mixed and mingled, we 
clung to the hot stones, while some crept in 
beneath the dead for shelter. So both wars 
clung to the ground for an hour's space. 
Then, suddenly the sun rushed out, and 
shaking sand from eyes and hair, and spit- 
tincr it from our mouths, at it we went ae"ain. 
It was an awful fight, John Norton, and more 
than once, in the mad midst of it, smoke- 
blinded and sand-choked, I thought of you 
and that I heard your rifle crack." 

" I would to God I had been there ! " ex- 
claimed the Trapper, and he dashed his huge 
hand into the air, as if cheering a line of battle 
on, while his eyes blazed and his face whitened. 



50 MAMELONS. 

"I would to God you had been!" returned 
the chief. '' For whether one Hved through 
it, or died in it, we made it great by great 
fighting. For we fought it to the end in 
spite of interruptions." 

" Interruptions ! " exclaimed the Trapper. 
"I. do not understand ye, chief. What but 
death could interrupt a fight like that?" 

" Listen, Trapper, listen," rejoined the chief, 
excitedly. *' Listen, that you may understand 
what stopped the fight, for never since man was 
born was fought such fight as we there fought, 
high up above the sea, that day at Mamelons. 
I told you it VvTis an old feud betv/een the 
Mountaineers and Esquimaux, a feud that had 
held its heat hot for a thousand years, and 
we, a thousand on each side, one for each 
year, fought on the sand, while above, below, 



MAMELONS. 5 1 

and around the dead of a thousand years, 
slain in the feud, fought too." 

*'Nay, nay," exclaimed the Trapper. ''Chief, 
it cannot be. The dead fight not, but live in 
peace forever, praise be to God," and he bowed 
his head reverently. 

"That is your faith, not mine, John Nor- 
ton, for I hold to an older faith — that men 
by a knife's thrust are not changed, but go, 
with all their passions with them, to the 
Spirit- Land, and there build upward on the 
old foundation. And so, I say again, that 
the dead of a thousand years fought in the 
air above and around us on that day at 
Mamelons. For in the pauses of the wind, 
we who fought on either side heard shrieks, 
and shouts, and tramplings as of ten thou- 
sand feet, and over us were roarings, and 



52 MA MELONS. 

bellowlngs, and hollow noises, dreadful to 
hear, and through all the battle went the 
word that ' the old dead ivere fighting, too!' 
and that made us wild. Both sides went 
mad. The dying cheered the living, and the 
living cheered the dead. So went the battle 
— the fathers and the sons, the dead and 
living, hard at it. The waters of the Sague- 
nay, a thousand feet below, were beaten into 
foam by the rush of fighting feet, and the 
roaring of a great battle filled its mouth. Its 
dark tide whitened with strange death froth 
from shore to shore, while ever and anon its 
surface shivered and shook. And under us 
on the high crest, cloud-wrapped, the earth 
trembled as we fought, so that more than 
once as we stood clinched, we two, the foe 
and I, still gripped for death, would pause 



MA MELONS. 53 

until the ground grew steady, for its trem- 
blings made us dizzy, then clinch the fiercer, 
mad with a great madness at being stopped 
in such death-grapple. Under us all the long 
afternoon the great mounds rose and sank 
like waves that have no base to stand upon. 
The clouds snowed ashes. Mud fell in show- 
ers. The air we breathed stank with brim- 
stone and burnt bones. And still it thick- 
ened, and still both sides, now but a scattered 
few, fought on, until at last, with a crash, as if 
the world had split apart, darkness, deep as 
death, fell suddenly, so that eyes were vain, and 
we who were not dead, unable to find foe, stood 
still. And thus the battle ended, even drawn, 
because God stopped the fight at Mamelons.' 

^ The Saguenay is undoubtedly of earthquake origin. 
The north shore of the St. Lawrence from Cape Tour- 



54 MA MELONS. 

" At last the morning dawned at Mamelons, 
and never since those ancient beaches ' saw 

mente to Point du Monts, is one of the earthquake cen- 
tres of the world. In 1663 a frightful series of convulsions 
occurred, lasting for more than four months ; and, it is 
said, that not a year passes that motions are not felt in 
the earth. The old maelstrom at Bai St. Paul was caused 
by subterranean force, and by subsequent shocks deprived 
of its terrible power. The mouth of the Saguenay was 
one of the great rendezvous of the Indian races long 
before Jacques Cartier came, and the great mounds above 
Tadousac have been the scene of many great Indian bat- 
tles ; but I would not make affidavit that an earthquake 
ever did actually take place while one was being fought, 
although there may have been, and certainly, from an 
artistic point of view, there should have been, such a 
poetic conjunction. 

^ These mamelons, or great sand mounds, are be- 
lieved to be the old geologic beaches of earliest times. 
They rise in tiers, or great terraces, one above the other, 
to a great height, the uppermost one being a thousand 
feet or more above the Saguenay, and represent, as they 



MA MELONS. 55 

the world's first morning-, had the round sim 
looked down on such a scene. The great 
terraces on which we fought were ankle deep 
with ashes mixed with mud, and cinders black 
and hard, like burnt iron, and all the sand 
was soaked with blood. The dead were 
heaped. They lay like drifted wreckage on 
a beach, where the eddying surges of the 
battle tossed them in piles and tangled heaps 
like jammed timber. For in the darkness, 
we had fought by sound, and not by sight, 
and where the battle roared loudest, thither 
had we rushed, usine axe and knife and the 
short seal spears of the damned Esquimaux. 
And all the later battle was fought breast to 

run down from terrace to terrace, the shrinking of the 
" face of the deep " in the creative period, by the shrink- 
ing of which the soUd earth rose in sight. 



56 MAMELONS. 

breast, for ere half were dead, powder and lead 
gave out, and the fray was hand to hand, until, 
by the sickening darkness, God stopped it. 

'* I searched the dreadful field from end 
to end to find my own, and found them. 
With blackened hands, clouted with blood, 
I drew them together. Forty in all, I 
stretched them, side by side, and the savage 
pride of the old blood in me burst from my 
mouth in a shrill yell, when I saw that tw^enty 
swarthy bosoms show^ed the knife's thrust 
deep and wide. They died like warriors, 
Trapper, true to the old Lenape blood, 
whose Tortoise ' steadfastness upheld the 

^ The Lenni-Lenape had, at the coming of the 
whites, their territory on the Delaware, but their tradi- 
tions point to long journeyings from the east over wide 
waters and cold countries. Their language, strange to 



MA MELONS. 57 

world. I made a mound above their bodies, 
and heaped it high with rounded stones 
which crowned the uppermost beach, and 
made wail above friends and kindred fallen 
in strange feud. And there they sleep, on 
that high verge, where the unwritten knowl- 
edge of my fathers, told from age to age, 
declare the waters of the earliest morning- 

o 

first found shore." [See note i, page 54.] 

say, has in it words identical with the old Basque 
tongue, and establishes some community of origin or 
history in the remote ages. The Lenni-Lenape had as 
their Totem, or sacred sign of origin and blood, a 
Tortoise with a globe on its back, and boasted that 
they were the oldest of all races of men, tracing their 
descent through the ages to that day when the world 
was upheld by a Tortoise, or turtle, resting in the 
midst of the waters. As a tribe they were very brave, 
proud, and honorable. 



58 MA MELONS. 

" Never did I hear a tale like this," ex- 
claimed the Trapper. " Strange stories of 
this hght I heard in the far north, chanted 
in darkness at midnight, with wild wailing 
of the tribes ; but I held it as the trick of 
sorcerers to friohten with. Go on and tell 
me all. Chief, what next befell thee ? " 

" John Norton, thou hast come half a 
thousand miles to hear a tale of death told 
by a dying man. Listen, and remember all 
I say, for at the close it touches close on 
thee. A fate whose meshes woven when our 
blood was crossed has tangled all that bore our 
name in ruin from the start, and with my going 
only one remains to suffer further." 

Here the chief paused while one might 
count a score, then, looking steadily at the 
Trapper, said : 



MAMELONS. 59 

'' Last month, when the raven was on the 
moon,' my warning came. The old wound 
opened without cause, and, lying on this bed, 
I saw the hour of my death, and beyond, 
thee, I saw, and beside thee the last and 
sweetest of our line, and the same doom 
was over her as has been to us all since the 
fatal cross — the doom which sends couraee 
and beauty to a quick, sad death." 

" I do not understand," replied the Trap- 
per. "Tell me what befell thee further, 
step by step, and how I, a man without a 
cross," can be connected with the old tradi- 
tions of thy tribe and house ? " 

^ When the raven was on the moon. An Indian 
description of an eclipse. 

^ A man without a cross, viz., a pure-blooded man. 
A white man without any Indian or foreign blood in 
his veins. 



6o MAMELONS. 

** Listen. In coming from the field, I saw, 
half-covered by the ashes, a body clothed in 
a foreign garb. It lay face downward where 
the dead were thickest, one arm outstretched, 
the hand of which, gloved to the wrist, still 
gripped a sword, red to its jeweled hilt. 
The head was foul with ash and sand, but I 
noted that the hair was black and long, and 
worn like a warrior's of our ancient race. 
Then I remembered a habit of boyish days 
and pride. Trembling, I stooped, lifted the 
body upward and turned the dead face 
toward me. And there, there on that field 
of Mamelons, where it was said of old, 
before one of my blood had ever seen 
the salted shore, the last of our race 
should die, all foul with ash and sand 
and blood, brows knit with battle rage, teeth 



MA MELONS. 6 1 

bared and tightly set, / saw my brother''^ 
facet" 

'' God In heaven ! " exclaimed the Trapper. 
" How came he there, and who killed him?" 

" John Norton, you know our cross, and 
that the best blood of the old world and the 
new, older than the old, Is In our veins. My 
grandsire was the son of one who stood next 
to the throne of France, and all our line have 
studied in her polished schools since red and 
white blood mingled in our veins. There did 
we two, my brother and I, remain until my 
father called us home. I left him high In the 
court's favor. Thence, suddenly, without send- 
ing word, with a young wife and office of 
trust, he voyaged, hoping to give me glad 
surprise. A tempest drove his ship on Lab- 
rador ; but he saved wife and gold. The 



62 MA MELONS, 

Esquimaux proved friendly, and gave him 
help, and, reckless of consequence, as have 
been all our line since the French taint came 
to us, not knowing cause, he joined the wild 
horde, and came with them to fatal Mamelons 
and its dread fight. 

'' So chanced it. Trapper. I dropped the 
body from my arms, for a great sickness 
seized me and my head swam, and in the 
bloody tangle of dead bodies I sat limp and 
lifeless. Then in a frenzy, clutching madly 
at a straw of hope, I tore the waistcoat, 
corded with gold, from the stiff breast to find 
proof that would not lie. And there, there 
above his heart, with eyes bloodshot and bul- 
ging, I saw the emblem of our tribe — the Tor- 
toise, with the round world on his back ; and 
through the sacred Totem of our ancient line- 



MAMELO.XS. ^1^ 

age, which our father's hand had tattooed on 
his chest and mine ; yea, through it and the 
white skin above his heart, there gaped a 
gash, swollen and red, which my own knife 
had made. For in the darkness of the fio-ht, 
bearing up against an Esquimaux rush, ash- 
bhnded, I found a foe who swore in French 
and had a sword. He and I fought grap 
pHng in the dark, when the earth hove be- 
neath our feet and ashes rained upon us ; 
and his sword ran me through even as I 
thrust my long knife into him. 

" And thus at Mamelons, where sits the 
doom of our race awaiting us, in its dread 
fight, both fighting without cause, I slew my 
brother, and from his hand I got the wound 
from whose old poison I now die. 

" Thus I stood among the dead at Mame- 



64 MAMELONS. 

Ions, a chief without a tribe and my brother's 
murderer. I moved some bodies and scraped 
downward, that I might have clean sand to 
fall upon ; then drew my knife to let life out, 
and thus meet bravely the old doom foretold 
for me and mine as awaiting us since man 
was born on the shore of that first world. 
But even as I bent to the knife's point, a 
voice called me and I turned. 

** It was an Esquimau ; the only chief left 
from the fight ; my brother's host seeking my 
brother. He knew me, for he and I had 
clinched in the great fight, but the earth 
opening parted us, and so both lived. Each 
felt for each as warriors feel for a brave foe 
when the red fight is ended and the field of 
death is heavy. Thus, batde-tired, amid the 
dead, we lifted hands, palm outward, and met 



MAMELONS. 65 

in peace. He knew the language of old 
France, and I told him of my woe, of our 
old race, of tribesmen dead, of brother slain 
by my own hand, and of the doom that waited 
for us over Mamelons. And then he spoke 
and told me that which stayed my hand and 
held me unto further life. 

'' Seven days I journeyed with him, and on 
the eighth I came to where she sat, amid 
his children, in his rude house at Labrador. 
Never, since God created woman, was one 
made so beautiful as she. She was of that 
old Iberian race, whose birth is older than 
annals, whose men conquered the world and 
whose women wedded gods. She was a 
Basque,' and her ancestor's ships had an- 

^ As far back in time as annals or traditions extend, 
a race of men called Iberians dwelt on the Spanish penin- 



66 MA MELONS. 

chorcd under Mamelons a thousand years 
before the Breton came. Fresh from the 

sula. Winchell says that " these Iberians spread over 
Spain, Gaul, and the British ishinds as early as 5000 
B.C. When* Egypt was only at her fourth dynasty this 
race had conquered all the world west of the IMediter- 
ranean." 

They originally settled Sardinia, Italy, and Sicily, and 
spread northward as far as Norway and Sweden. Strabo 
says, speaking of a branch of this race : " llicy employ 
the art of writing, and have written books containing 
memorials of ancient times, and also poems and laws 
set in verse, for which they claim an antiquity of Gooo 
years. These old Ibeiians to-day are represented by the 
Basques. The Basques are fast d\ing out, and but a 
small remnant is left. They undoubtedly represent the 
first race of men. They are proud, merry, and pas- 
sionate. The women are very beautiful, and noted for 
their wit, vivacity, and subtle grace of person. They 
love music, and dance much. Some of their dances are 
symbolic and connected with their ancient mysteries. 
Their language is unconnected with any European tongue 



MAMELOAS. ^-j 

dreadful field, with heart of lead, my broth- 
er's face staring whitely at me as I talked, I 
told her all — the fight, the death of brother 
and of tribe, and the doom that waited 
for our blood above the shinlncr ' sands at 
Mamelons. 

or dialect, but, strange to say, it is connected by close 
resemblance, in many words, with the Maiya language 
of Central America and that of the Algonquin-Lenape 
and a few other of our Indian tribes. Duponceau says 
of the Basque tongue : 

'* This language, preserved in a corner of Europe by a 
few thousand INIountaineers, is the sole remaini.ig frag- 
ment of perliaps a hundred dialects, constructed on the 
same plan, which probably existed and were universally 
spoken at a remote period in that quarter of the world. 
Like the bones of the mammoth, it remains a monument 
of the destruction produced by a succession of ages. It 
stands single and alone of its kind, surrounded by idioms 
that have no affinity with it." 



68 MAMELONS. 

" She listened to the end. Then rose and 
took iny hand and kissed it, saying : ' Brother, 
I kiss thy hand as head of our house. What's 
done is done. The dead cannot come back.' 
Then, covering up her face with her rich 
laces, she went within the hanging skins, and 
for seven days was hidden with her woe. 

" But when the seven days were passed 
she came, and we held council. Next morn, 
with ten canoes deep laden with gold and 
precious stuff's, that portion of her dower 
saved from the wreck, we started hitherward. 
This island, after many days of voyaging, 
we reached, and landed here, by chance or 
fate I know not, for she spake the word that 
stopped us on this shore, not I. For on this 
island did my fathers live, and here the fate- 
ful cross came to our blood, that cross with 



MAMELONS. 69 

France which was not fit ; for the traditions 
of our tribe — a mystery for a thousand years 
— had said that any cross of red with white 
should ripen doom at Mamelons ; for there 
it was the white first landed on the shore 
of this western world.' 

^ The antiquity of European visitation to the St. 
Lawrence is unascertained, and, perhaps, unascertain- 
able. But there is good reason to think that long be- 
fore Jacques Cartier, Cabot, or even the Norsemen, 
ever saw the American continent, the old Basque people 
carried on a regular commerce in fish and fur with the 
St. Lawrence. It is not impossible but that Columbus 
obtained sure knowledge of a western hemisphere from 
the old race, who dwelt, and had dwelt, immemorially 
among the mountains of Spain, as well as from the 
Norse charts. Their language, legends, traditions, and 
many signs compel one to the conclusion that the old 
Iberian race, who once held all modern Europe and 
the British isle in subjection, was of ocean origin, and 
pushed on the van of an old-time and world-wide navi- 



70 MAMELONS. 

'' She needed refuge, for within her Hfe- 
another hfe was growing. Brooding, she 
prayed that the new soul within her might 
not be a boy. ' A boy,' she said, ' must meet 
the doom foretold. A girl, perchance, might 
not be held.' Her faith and mine were one, 
save hers was older, she being of the old 
trunk stock, of which the world-supporting 
Tortoise were a branch ; and so my blood 
was later, flowing from noonday fountains, 
while hers ran warm and red, a pure, sole 
stream, which burst from out the ponderous 
front of dead eternity, when, with His living 
rod, God smote it, in the red sunrise of the 

gation beyond the record of modern annals. Both 
Jacques Cartier and John Cabot found, with astonish- 
ment, old Basque names everywhere, as they sailed 
up the coast, the date of whose connection with the 
geography of the shores the natives could not tell. 



MAMELONS. 7 1 

world. On this her soul was set, nor could 
I change her thought with reason, which I 
vainly tried, lest if the birth should prove a 
boy, the shock should kill her. But she held 
stoutly to it, saying : 

'''The women of our race get what they 
crave. My child shall be a woman, and 
being so, win what she plays for.' 

" And, lo ! she had her wish ; for when 
the babe was born it was a girl. 

" All since is known to you, for you, by 
a strange fate, blown, like a cone of the 
high pine from the midst of whirlwinds, 
when forest fires are kindled and the gales 
made by their heat blow hot a thousand 
miles across the land, dropped on this island 
like help from Heaven. Twice was I saved 
from death by thee. Twice was she rescued 



-2 ' MAMELONS. 

at the peril of thy hfe ; mother and child, 
by thy quick hand, snatched out of death. 
And when the cursed fever came, and she 
and I lay, like two burning brands, you 
nursed us both, and from your arms at last, 
her eyes upon you lovingly, her soul unwill- 
ingly, under fate, went from us. And her 
sweet form, instinct with the old grace and 
passion of that vanished race which once 
outrivaled Heaven's beauty and won wed- 
lock with the gods, lay on your bosom as 
some rare rose, touched by untimely frost, 
while yet its royal bloom is opening to the 
sun, lies, leaf loosened, a lovely ruin rudely 
made on the harsh gravel walk." 

Here the chief stopped with a gasp, struck 
through and through with sharp pains. His 
face whitened and he groaned. The spasm 



MA MELONS. 7-, 

passed, but left him weak. Rallying, with 
effort, he went on : 

'' I must be brief. That spasm was the 
second. The third will end me. God ! 
How the old stab jumps to-night ! 

''Trapper, you know how wide our titles 
reach. A hundred miles from east to west, 
from north to south, the manor runs. It is 
a princely stretch. A time will come when 
cities will be on it, and its deeds of warranty 
be worth a kingdom. Would that a boy 
outside the deadly limits of the cross, but 
dashed with the old blood in vein and skin, 
were born to heir the place and live as mas- 
ter on these lakes and hills, on which the 
mighty chiefs who bore the Tortoise sign 
upon their breasts when it upheld the world, 
beyond the years of mortal memory, lived 



74 MAMELONS. 

and hunted ! For when the doom In the 
far past, before one of our blood had ever 
seen the salted shore, was spoken, It was 
said : 

'''This doom, for sin against the blood, 
shall not touch one born in the female line 
from sire without a cross.' 

" I tell you. Trapper, a thousand chiefs 
of the old race would leave their graves and 
fight again at Mamelons to see the old doom 
broken, and a boy, with one clear trace of 
ancient blood in vein and skin, ruling as 
master here! And I, who die to-night, I, 
and he who gave me death and whom I slew, 
would rise to lead them ! 

" John Norton, you I have called ; you 
who have saved my life and whose life I 
have saved ; you, who have stood in battle 



MA MELONS. 75 

with me when the red Hne wavered and 
we two saved the fight ; you who have the 
wild deer's foot, the cougar's strength, 
whose word once given stands, like a 
chiefs, the test of fire ; you, all white in 
face, all red at heart, a Tortoise, and yet a 
man without a cross, have I called half a 
thousand miles to ask with dying breath this 
question : 

" May not that boy be born, the old race 
kept alive, the long curse stayed, and ended 
with my life forever be the doom of Marne- 
lons ? Speak, Trapper, friend, comrade in 
war, in hunt and hall, speak to my failing 
ear, that I may die exultant and tell the 
thousand chiefs that throng to greet me in 
the Spirit-land that the old doom is lifted 
and a race with blood of theirs in vein and 



76 MAMELONS. 

skin shall live and rule forever mid their 
native hills ? " 

From the first word the strange tale, half 
chanted, had rolled onward like the great 
river flooding upward from the gulf, between 
narrowing banks, with swift and swifter mo- 
tion, growing pent and tremulous as it flows, 
until it challenges the base of Cape Tour- 
ment with thunder. And not until the dying 
chief, with headlong haste, had launched the 
query forth — the solemn query, whose answer 
would fix the bounds of fate forever — did the 
Trapper dream whither the wild tale tended. 
His face whitened like a dead man's, and he 
stood dumb — dumb with doubt and fear and 
shame. At last, with efl~ort, as when one lifts 
a mighty weight, he said, and the words were 
heaved from out his chest, as great weights 



MAMELOAS. jj 

from deepest depths : '* Chief, ye know not 
what ye ask. My God ! I am not fit ! " 

Across the swarth face of the dying man 
there swept a flash of flame, and his glazed 
eyes Hghted with a mighty joy. 

"Enough! enough! It is enough!" he 
cried. '' The women of her race will have 
their way, and she will win thee. God ! If 
I might live to see that brave boy born, the 
spent fountain of the old race filled again 
by that rich tide in her which flows red and 
warm from the sunrise of the world ! Nay, 
^nay. Thou shalt not speak again. I leave 
it in the hands of fate. Before I pass the 
seeing eye will come, and I shall see if sun- 
light shines on Mamelons." 

He touched a silver bell above his head, 
and, after pause, the girl, in whom the beauty 



78 MAMELONS. 

of her mother and her race hved on, whose 
form was hthe, but rounded full, whose face 
was dark as woods, but warmly toned with 
the old Basque splendor, like wine when 
light shines through it, type of the two old- 
est and handsomest races of the world, stood 
by his side. 

Long gazed the chief upon her, a vision 
too beautiful for earth, too warm for heaven. 
The light of a great pride was in his eyes, 
but shaded with mournful pity. 

" Last of my race," he murmured. " Last 
of my blood, farewell ! Thou hast thy mother's 
beauty, and not a trace of the damned cross 
is on thee. Follow thou thy heart. The 
women of thy race won so. My Yeet are 
on the endless trail blazed by my fathers for 
ten thousand years. I cannot tarry if I would. 



MAMELONS. 79 

I leave thee under care of this just man. Be 
thou his comfort, as he will be thy shield. 
There is a chest, thy mother's dying gift, thou 
knowest where. Open and read, then shalt 
thou know. Trapper, read thou the ritual of 
the church above my bier. So shall it please 
thee. Thou art the only Christian I ever 
knew who kept his word and did not cheat 
the red man. Some trace of the old faiths, 
therefore, there must be in these modern 
creeds, albeit the holders of them cheat and 
fight each other. But, daughter of my house, 
last of my blood, born under shadow, and it 
may be unto doom, make thou my burial in 
the old fashion of thy race, older than mine. 
These modern creeds and mushroom rituals 
are not for us whose faiths were born when 
God was on the earth, and His sons married 



8o MAMELONS. 

the daughters of men. So bury me, that I 
may join the old-time folk who lived near 
neighbors to this modern God, and married 
their daughters to His sons." 

Here paused he for a space, for the old 
wound jumped, and life flowed with his blood. 

Then suddenly a change came to his face. 
His eyes grew fixed. He placed one hand 
above the staring orbs, as if to help them 
see afar. A moment thus. Then, whisper- 
ing hoarsely, said : 

''Take thou his hand. Cling to it. The 
old Tortoise sio^ht at death is comincr. I see 
the past and future. Daughter, I see thee 
now, and by thy side, thy arms around his 
neck, his arms round thee, the man without a 
cross ! Aye. She was right. ' The women 
of my race get what they crave.' Girl, thou 



Af A MELONS. gj 

hast won ! Rejoice, rejoice and sing-. But, 
oh! my God! My God! John Norton! 
Look ! Daughter, last of my blood, In spite 
of all, in spite of all, above thy head hangs, 
breaking black, the doom of Mamelons ! " 

And with these words of horror on his lips, 
the chief, whose bosom bore the Tortoise sio-n 
who killed his brother under doom at Mame- 
lons, fell back stone dead. 

So died he. Three days went by in silence. 
Then did the two build high his bier in the 
great hall, and place him on it, stripped like 
a warrior, to his waist, for so he charged the 
Trapper it should be. Thus sitting in the 
great chair of cedar, hewn to the frao-rant 
heart. In the wide hall, hound at feet, the 
Tortoise showing plainly on his breast, a fire 
of great knots, gummed with odorous pitch, 



82 MA MELONS, 

blazing on the hearth, the two, each by the 
faith that guided, made, for the dead chief of 
a dead tribe, strange funeral. 

And first, the Trapper, standing by the bier, 
gazed long and steadfastly at the dead man's 
face. Then the girl, going to the mantel, 
reached for a book and placed it in his hand 
and stood beside him. 

Then, after pause, he read : 
''I am the resitrrection and the Life!' 
And the liturgy, voiced deeply and slowly 
read, as by one who readeth little and labors 
with the words, sounded through the great 
hall solemnly. 

Then the girl, standing by his side, in the 
splendor of her beauty, the lights shining 
warmly on the dark glory of her face, lifted 



up 



her voice — a voice fuofitive from heaven's . 



t> 



MAMELONS, 83 

choir — and sang the words the Trapper had 
intoned : 

''I am the resurrection and the Life!' 

And her rich tones, pure as note of hermit- 
thrush cleaving the still air of forest swamps ; 
clear as the song of morning lark singing in 
the dewy sky, rose to the hewn rafters and 
swelled against the compressing roof as if 
they would break out of such imprisonment, 
and roll their waves of sound afar and up- 
ward until they mingled with kindred tones 
in heaven. 

Again the Trapper : 

''He who believeth in vie, though he ivere 
dead, yet shall he live ! " 

And again the marvellous voice pealed forth 
the words of everlasting hope, as if from the 
old race that lived in the dawn of the world, 



g^ MA MELONS, 

whose blood was in her rich and red, had 
come to her the memory of the music they 
had heard run thrilHng through the happy air 
when the stars of the morning sang together 
for joy. 

Alas, that such a voice from the old days 
of soul and song should lie smothered for- 
ever beneath the sand of Mamelons ! 

Thus the first part. For the Trapper, like 
a Christian man without cross, would give his 
dead friend holy burial. Then came a pause. 
And for a space the two sat silent in the 
great hall, wdiile the pitch knots flamed and 
flared their splashes of red light through the 
gloom. 

Then rose the girl and took the Trapper's 
place at the dead man's feet. Her hair, black 
with a glossy blackness, swept the floor. A 



MA MELONS. gc 

jewel, large and lustrous, an heirloom of her 
mother's race, old as the world, burning with 
Atlantean flame, a miracle of stone-impris- 
oned fire, blazed on her brow. The laro-e 
gloom of her eyes was turned upon the dead 
man's face, and the sadness of ten thousand 
years of life and loss was darkly orbed within 
their long and heavy lashes. Her small, 
swarth hands hung lifeless at her side, and 
the bowed contour of her face drooped heavy 
with grief. Thus she, clothed in black cloth 
from head to foot, as if that old past, whose 
child she was, stood shrouded in her form, 
ready to make wail for the glory of men 
and the beauty of women it had seen buried 
forever in the silent tomb. 

Thus stood she for a time, as if she held 
communion with the grave and death. Then 



86 MAMELONS. 

opened she her mouth, and in die mode when 
song was language, she poured her feeHngs 
forth in that old tongue, which, like some 
fragrant fragment of sweet wood, borne north- 
w^ard by great ocean currents out of southern 
seas, for many days storm tossed, but lodged 
at last on some far shore and found by those 
who only sense the sweetness, but know not 
whence it came, lies lodged to-day upon the 
mountain slopes of Spain. Thus, in the old 
Basque tongue, sweet fibre of lost root, un- 
known to moderns, but soft, and sad, and 
wild with the joy, the love, the passion of 
ten thousand years, this child of the old past 
and the old faiths, lifted up her voice and sang : 
"O death! I hate thee! Cold thou art 
and dreadful to the touch of the warm hand 
and the sweet lips which, drawn by love's 



MA MELONS. g? 

dear habit, stoop to kiss the mouth for the 
long- parting. Cold, cold art thou, and at thy 
touch the blood of men is chilled and the 
sweet glow in woman's bosom frozen forever. 
Thou art great nature's curse. The grape 
hates thee. Its blood of fire can neither 
make thee laugh, nor sing, nor dance. The 
sweet flower, and the fruit which ripens on 
the bough, nursing its juices from the ma- 
ternal air, and the bird sincrino- his love-sono- 
to his mate amid the blossoms — hate thee ! 
At touch of thine, O slayer! the flower fades, 
the fruit withers and falls, and the bird drops 
dumb into the grasses. Thou art the shadow 
on the sunshine of the world ; the skeleton 
at all feasts ; the marplot of great plans ; the 
stench which fouls all odors; the slayer of 
men and the murderer of women. O death ! 



88 MAMELONS. 

I, child of an old race, last leaf from a tree 
that shadowed the world, warm in my youth, 
loving life, loving health, loving love. O 
death ! how I hate thee ! " 

Thus she sang, her full tones swelling fuller 
as she sang, until her voice sent its clear 
challenge bravely out to the black shadow on 
the sunshine of the world and the dread fate 
she hated. 

Then did she a strange thing ; a rite known to 
the morning of the world when all the living 
lived in the east and the dead went westward. 

She took a gourd, filled to the browm brim, 
and placed it in the dead man's stiffened 
hand, then laid a rounded loaf beside his 
knee, and on a plate of copper at his feet — 
serpent edged, and in the centre a pictured 
island lying low and long in the blue seas, 



MAMELONS. 89 

bold with bluff mountains toward the east, 
but sinking westward until it ran from sight 
under the ocean's rim, a marvel of old art 
in metal working, lost for aye — she placed 
a living coal, and on it, from a golden acorn 
at her throat, which opened at touch, she 
shook a dust, which, falling on the coal, 
burned rosy red and filled the hall with lan- 
guorous odors sweet as Heaven. Then, at 
triumphant pose, she stood and sang : 

Water for thy thirst I have given, 

Hurry on ! hurry on ! 
Bread for .thy hunger beside thee, 

Speed away ! speed away ! 
Fire for thy need at thy feet. 
Mighty chief, fly fast and fly far 
To the land where thy father and clans- 



QO MAMELONS. 

Odor and oil for the woman thou lovest, 
Sweet and smooth may she be on thy breast, 
When her soft arms enfold thee. 

O death ! thou art cheated ! 

He shall thirst never more ; 

He shall eat and be filled ; 

The fire at his feet will revive him ; 

Oil and odor are his for the woman he loves; 

He shall live, he shall live on forever 

With his sires and his people. 
He shall love and be loved and be happy. 

O ! death grim and great, 

O ! death stark and cold, 

By a child of the old race that first lived 

And first met thee ; 
The race that lived first, still lives 

And will live forever. 
By the child of the old blood, by a girl! 

Thou art cheated ! 



CHAPTER III. 



THE MOTHERS MESSAGE. 



T^VENING was on the woods. The girl, 

^^ her mother's message in her hands, gift 

from the chest that owned the golden key, 

sat reading. And this is what she read : 

** My daughter : They tell me I must 

die. I know it, for a chill, strange to my 

blood, is creeping through and thickening 

in my veins. It is the old tale told from the 

beginning of the world — of warm blood 

frozen when 'tis warmest, and beauty blasted 

at its fullest bloom. For I am at that age 

when woman's nature gives most and gets 

most from sun and flower, from touch of 

91 



92 MAMELONS. 

baby hands and man's strong love, and all 
the blood within her moves, tremulous with 
forces whose working makes her pure and 
sweet, as moves the strong wine in the cask 
when ripening its red strength and flavor. 
O daughter of a race that never lied save 
for a loved one ! blood of my blood, remem- 
ber that your mother died hating to die ; 
died when life was fullest, sweetest, fiercest 
in her ; for life is passionate force, and when 
full is fierce to crave, to seek, to have and 
hold, and has been so since man loved 
woman and by woman was beloved. And so 
it is with me. A woman, I crave to live, 
and, craving life, must die. 

" Death ! how I hate thee ! What right 
hast thou to claim me now when I am at 
my sweetest? The withered and the wrin- 



MA MELONS. o^ 

kled are for thee. For thee the colorless 
cheek, the shrivelled breast, the skinny hand 
that shakes as shakes the leaf, frost smitten 
to Its fall, the lustreless eye, and the lone 
soul that looketh longingly ahead where wait 
its loved ones ; such are for thee, not I. For 
I am fair and fresh and full through every 
vein of those quick forces, which belong to 
life, and hate the grave. This, that you 
may know your mother died unwillingly, and 
dying hated death, as all of the old race 
and faith have ever done since he first 
came, a power, a mystery and a curse into 
the world. For in the ancient annals of our 
fathers it was written 'that in the beo-In- 
ning of the world there was no death, but 
life was all in all.' God talked with them 
as father talks with children; their dauo-h- 



94 MAMELONS. 

ters were married to His sons, and earth 
and heaven were one. 

*' Your father was of France, but also of 
that blood next oldest ours. He was Lenape, 
a branch blown from that primal tree which 
was the world's first growth, whose roots 
ran under ocean before the first world sank ; 
a branch blown far by fate, w^hich, falling, 
struck deep into the soil of this western 
world, and, vital with deathless sap, grew 
and became a tree. This was in ancient 
days, when thoughts of men were writ in 
pictures and the round world rested on a 
Tortoise's back — emblem of water. For the 
first world was insular, and blue seas washed 
it from end to end, a mighty stretch, which 
reached from sunrise into sunset, through 
many zones. Long after men lost knowl- 



MAMELONS. g^ 

edge and the earth was flat, and for a thou- 
sand years the Tortoise symbol was an 
unread riddle save to us of the old blood, 
who knew the pictured tongue, and laughed 
to see the later races, mongrel in blood and 
rude, flatten out the globe of God until it 
lay flat as their ignorance. Your father was 
Lenape, who bore upon his breast the Tor- 
toise symbol of old knowledge made safe 
by sacredness ; for the wise men of his race, 
that the old fact might not be lost, but borne 
safely on like a dry seed blown over deserts 
until it comes to w^ater, and, lodging, finds 
chance to grow into a full flowered, fruitful 
tree, made it, when they died and knowledge 
passed, the Totem of his tribe. Thus the 
dead symbol kept the living fact alive. Nor 
were there lacking other proofs that his blood 



96 MAMELONS. 

was one with mine, though reaching us 
through world-wide channels. For in his 
tongue, like flecks of gold in heaps of com- 
mon sand, were words of the old language, 
clear and bright with the original lustre, 
when gold was sacred ornament and had no 
vulgar use. The mongrel moderns have made 
it base and fouled it with dirty trade ; but 
in the beginning, and by those of primal 
blood, who knew they were of heaven, it was 
a sacred metal, held for God.' 

^ Among many of the ancient races gold and silver 
were sacred metals, not used in commerce, but dedi- 
cated as votive offerings, or sent to the temples as dues 
to the gods. Nothing more astonished and puzzled 
the natives of Peru and Mexico than the eagerness 
with which the Spaniards sought for gold, and the high 
value they put upon it. A West Indian savage traded 
a handful of gold dust with one of the sailors with 



MAMELONS. 97 

" We met in France, and by French custom 
were allied. I was a girl, and knew not my 
own self, and he a boy scarce twenty. Rea- 
sons of state there were to prompt our mar- 
riage, and so we were joined. He was of our 
old blood. That drew me, and no other thing, 
for love moved not within me, but nested 
calmly in my breast as a young bird, ere yet 
its wings are grown or it has thrilled with 
flight, rests in its downy cincture. He died 
at Mamelons ; died under doom. You know 
the tale. He died and you came, fatherless, 
into the world. 

" You are your mother's child. In face and 
form, in eye and every look, you are of me 

Columbus for some small tool, and then ran as for his 
life to the woods, lest the sailor should repent his 
bargain and demand the tool to be given back ! 



98 MA MELONS. 

and not of him. The French cross in his 
blood made weakness, and die stronger blood 
prevailed. This is the law. A turbid stream 
sinks with quick ebb ; the pure flows level 
on. The Jews prove this. The ancient wis- 
dom stands in them. The creed, which steals 
from their old faith, whatever makes it strong, 
has armed the world against them, but their 
blood triumphs. The old tide, red and true, 
unmixed, pure, laughs at these mongrel 
streams. Strong with pure strength it bides 
its time. The world will yet be theirs, and 
so the prophecy of their sacred books be 
met. Pure blood shall win, albeit muddy 
veins to-day are boasted of by fools. 

'' But we are older far than they. The 
Jews are children, while on our heads the 
rime of hoary time rests white as snow. Our 



MAMELONS. 99 

race was old when Egypt, sailing from our an- 
cestral ports, reached, as a colony, the Nile.' 
From tideless Sea,^ to the Green Island in 
the west,^ from southern Spain to Arctic 
zones, the old Basque banner waved; while 
under Mamelons, where waits the doom for 
insult to pure blood, your fathers anchored 
ships from the beginning. What loss came 
to the earth when the gods of the old world, 
of whom we are, sank under sea and with 
them took the perfect knowledge ! Alas ! 
alas ! the chill creeps in and on and I must 

^ It is certain that the Iberian race settled on the 
Spanish peninsuhi a long time before the Egyptians, a 
sister colony from the same unknown parental source, 
doubtless, began their marvellous structures on the 
Nile. 

^ The Mediterranean. 

^ Ireland. 



lOO MAMKLONS. 

hurry ! I would make you wise before I 
die with a wisdom which none save the 
women of our race might speak or learn. 

" You will read this when I am fixed among 
the women of our race in the ereat realms 
where they are queens. For since the first 
the women of our race have ruled and had 
their way, whether for good or ill, and both 
have come to them and through them unto 
others. And so forever will it be. For 
beauty is a fate, and unto what 'tis set none 
know. The issue proves it and naught else. 
So be it. She who has the glory of the fate 
should have the couraore to bide issue. 

** Your body is my iDody ; your face my 
face ; your blood my blood. The warmth of 
the old fires are in it, and the sweet heat 
which glows in you will make you under- 



MAMELONS. lOI 

Stand. You are my child, and being so, I 
give you of myself. I love. Love as the 
women of our race and only they may love. 
Love with a love that maketh all my life so 
that without it all is death to me. That love 
I, dying, bestow on you. It came to me like 
flash of fire on altar when holy oils are kin- 
dled and the censer swung. Here I first 
met him. Death had me. He fouorht and 
took me from his hand. In the beeinnino-, 
men were large and strong, and women 
beautiful. Giants were on the earth, and 
our mothers wedded them. Each was a rose, 
thorn-guarded, and the strongest plucked 
her when in bloom and wore her, full of 
sweets, upon his bosom. Since then the 
women of our blood have loved large men. 
Weak ones we hated. None save the 



102 MAMELONS. 

mighty, brawny, and brave have ever felt 
our soft arms round them, or our mouths 
on theirs. Thus has it been. 

*' I loved him, for his strength was as the 
ancients, and with it gentleness like the 
gods. But he was humble, and knew not 
his own greatness, and, blinded by humility, 
he would not see that I was his. So I 
waited, waited as all women wait, that they 
may win. It is not art, but nature, the 
nature of a rose, which, daily opening more 
and more to perfect bloom in his warm light, 
makes the sun know his power at last. For 
love reveals all greatness in us, as it does 
all faults. Well did I know that he should 
see at last his fitness for me, and, w^ithout 
violence to himself, yield to my loveliness 
and be drawn within the circle of my arms. 



MAMELONS. 103 

So should I win at last, as have the women 
of our race won always. But death mars 
all. So has it been since women lived. His 
is the only knife whose edge may cut the 
silken bands we wind round men. Vain is 
all else. Faiths may not stand against us, 
nor pride, nor honor. Our power draws 
stronger. The grave alone makes gap 'twixt 
lovely woman's loving and bridal bed. So, 
dying thus before my time I am bereft of all. 
*' But you shall win, for in you I shall live 
again and to full time. I know that you will 
love him, for you drew my passion to you 
with my milk, and all my thoughts were of 
him, when, with large receptive eyes, you 
lay a baby in my arms, day after day, scan- 
ning my face, love-lighted for him. Aye, 
you will love him. For in your sleep, 



I04 MAMELONS. 

cradled on the heart that worshiped him, its 
warmth for him warmed you, its beating 
thrilled, and from my mouth, murmured 
caressingly in dreams, your ears and tongue 
learned his dear name before mine own. So 
art thou fated unto love as I to death. 
Both could not wdn, and hence, perhaps, 'tis 
well I die. For had both lived, then both 
had loved, mother and child been rivals, and 
one suffered worse than dying. Nor am I 
without joy. For once, when I was wooing 
him with art he did not know, coaxing him 
up to me with sweet praises sweetly said, 
and purposely I swayed so my warm body 
fell into his arms and there lay for a moment, 
vibrant, all aglow, while all my woman's soul 
went through my lifted and dimmed eyes to 
him, I saw a flash of fire flame in his face. 



MA MELONS. IO5 

and felt a throb jump through his body, as 
the God woke in him, which told me he was 
mortal. And, faint with joy, I slid down- 
ward from his arms and in the fragrant 
grasses sat, throbbing, covering up my face 
with happy hands lest he should see the 
glory of it and be frightened at what his 
touch had done. I swear by the old blood, 
that moment's triumph honored, that the 
memory of that blissful time takes from death 
its sting and robs the grave of victory, as 
I lie dying. 

** Yea, thou shalt win. The power will be 
in thee, as it has been in me, to win him or 
any whom women made as we set heart on. 
But woo him with that old art of innocence, 
snow white, though hot as fire, lost to the 
weak or brazen women of these mongrel 



I06 MAMELONS. 

races that fill the world to-day, who dare not 
dare, or daring, overdo. Be slow as sunrise. 
Let thy love dawn on him as morning dawns 
upon the earth, and warmth and light grow 
evenly, lest the quick flash blind him, or the 
sudden heat appall, and he see nothing right, 
but shrink from thee and his new self as 
from a wicked thing. I may not help thee. 
What fools these moderns are to think so. 
The dead have their own lives and loves, and 
note not the living. Else none might be at 
peace or know comfort above the sky, and all 
souls would make wail for wrongs and woes 
done and borne under sun. So is it well 
that parting should be parting, and what wall 
divides the dead from living be beyond pen- 
etration. For each woman's life is sole. Her 
plans are hidden with her love. Her skill is 



MAMELONS. I07 

of It a sweet secrecy, and all her winning Is 
self-won. I do not fear. Thou wilt have the 
wooing wisdom of thy race. Thy eyes are 
such as men give life to look Into. The pas- 
sion In thy blood would purchase thrones. 
Thou hast the grace of form which maddens 
men. Thy voice Is music. Thy touch warm 
velvet to the skin. The first and perfect 
woman lives complete, In thee! 

" No more. In the old land no one Is left. 
The modern cancer eats all there. New fash- 
ions and new faiths crowd in. Only low blood 
is left, and that soon yields to pelf and pain. 
Last am I of the queenly line and thou art 
last of me. I came of gods. To gods I go. 
The tree that bore the fruit of knowledge for 
our sex In the sunrise of the world is stripped 
to the last sweet leaf. If thou shalt die leav- 



Io8 MAMELONS, 

ing no root, the race God made is ended. 
With thee the gods quit earth, and the old 
red blood beats back and upward to the skies. 
Gold hast thou and broad acres. Youth and 
health are thine. Win his ereat strength to 
thee, for he is pure as strong, and from a 
primal man get perfect children, that in this 
new world in the west a new race may arise 
rich in old blood, born among the hills, strong 
with the strength of trees, whose sons shall 
be as mountains, and whose daughters as the 
lakes, whose loveliness is lovelier because of 
the reflected mountains dimly seen in them. 

'• Farewell. Love greatly. It is the only 
way that leadeth woman to her heaven. The 
moderns have a saying in their creed that God 
is love. In the beginning he was Father. 
The race that sprang from Him said that, 



MAMELONS. IO9 

and said no more. It was enough. Love 
then was human, and we gloried in it. Not 
the pale love of barren nun, but love red as 
the rose, warm as the sun, the love of moth- 
erly women, sweet mouthed, deep breasted, 
voiced with cradle songs and soft melodies 
which made men love their homes. Love 
thou and live on the old level. Be not 
ashamed to be full woman. Love strength. 
Bear children to it. Be mother of a mighty 
race born for this western world. Multiply. 
Inherit ; and send the old blood flowine fro'm 
thy veins, a widening current, thrilling through 
the ages ; that it may be as red, as pure, as 
strong at sunset as it was in the sunrise of 
the world. 

" Once more, farewell, sweet daughter. 
These are last words, a voice from out the 



I lO MA MELONS. 

sunset, sweet and low as altar hymn wan- 
dering down the columned aisles of some 
old temple. So may it sound to thee. So 
live, so woo, so win, that when thou comest 
through the portals of the west to that fair 
throne amid those other ones which stretch 
their stateliness across the endless plain of 
ended things, which waits for thee as one 
has waited for every woman of our queenly 
line, thou shalt leave behind at going a new 
and noble race, from thee and him, in which 
the east and west, the sunrise and the sun- 
set of the world shall, like two equal glories, 
meet condensed and shine. So fare thee 
well. Fear not Mamelons. For if thou fail- 
est there, thou shalt be free of fault, and all 
the myriad millions of our blood shall out 
of sunset march, and from the shining sands 



MAMELONS, 1 1 i 

of fate lift thee high and place thee on the 
last, the highest, and the whitest throne of 
our old line. So ends it. One more sweet 
kiss, sweet one. One more long look into 
his face — grave, grave and sad he gazeth 
at me. God ! What a face he has ! Shall 
I find match for it to-morrow when I stand, 
amid the royal, beyond sunset ? Perhaps. 
Death, you have good breeding. You have 
waited well. Come, now, I will go on with 
thee. Yes, yes, I see the way. 'Tis very 
plain. It has been hollowed by so many 
feet. Good-bye to earthly light and life. It 
may be I shall find a better. I'll know to- 
morrow." 

Here the scroll ended. Long the living 
sat pondering what the dead had writ. She 
kissed the writing as it were holy text. Th jh 



112 MAMELONS. 

placed it in the chest, and turned the golden 
key and said: "Sweet mother, thou shalt 
live in me. Our race shall not die out. My 
love shall win him." Then went she to the 
great room wherein the Trapper by the red 
fire sat and said : " John Norton, thou art 
my guest. What may I do to pleasure 
thee ? Here thou must stay until my mind 
can order out my life and make the dubious 
road ahead look plain. While underneath 
my roof, I pray, command me." 

All this with such grave dignity and sweet 
grace as she were queen and he some kins- 
man, great and wise. 

The Trapper stooped and lifted a huge log 
upon the fire, which broke the lower brands. 
The chimney roared, and the large room bright- 
ened to the fiame. Then, facing her, he said : 



ATA MELONS. II3 

*' Guest I am and servant, both In one, 
and must be so awhile. Winter is on us. 
The fire feels snow. It putters as if the 
flakes were falling in it. It is a sign that 
never lies. Hark ! you can hear the konk 
of geese as they wedge southward. The 
winter will be long, but I must stay." 

"And are you sorry you must stay?" re- 
plied the girl. " I will do what I may to 
make the days and nights pass swiftly." 

" Nay, nay, you do mistake," returned the 
Trapper. " I am not sorry for myself, but 
thee. If I may only help thee : how can I 
help thee ? " 

''John Norton," replied the girl, and she 
spoke with sweet earnestness as when the 
heart is vocal, '' thou art a man, and wise ; 
I am a girl, and know nought save books. 



114 MA MELONS. 

But you, you have seen many men and tribes 
of men ; counciled with chiefs, been comrade 
with the great, sharing their inner thoughts 
in peace and war, and thou hast done great 
deeds thyself, of which fame speaks widely. 
Why do you cheapen your own value so, 
calling thyself a common man ? My uncle 
said you were the best, the bravest, and the 
wisest man he ever met, and he had sat with 
kings and chiefs, and heard the best men 
of both worlds tell all they knew. Dear 
friend, wilt thou not be my teacher, arid 
teach me that, which lieth now, like treasure 
hidden, locked in thy silence ? " 

''I teach thee!" exclaimed the Trapper. 
"I, an unlettered man, a hunter of the 
woods, teach one who readeth every tongue, 
who knoweth all the past, to the beginning 



MA MELONS. II5 

of the world, whose head has in it all these 
shelves of knowledge," and the Trapper 
swept a gesture toward the thousand books 
that thickened the great hall from floor to 
ceiling. " I teach thee ! " 

"Yes, you," answered the girl. "You can 
teach me, or any woman that ever lived, or 
any man. For you were given at your birth 
the seeing eye, the listening ear, and the 
still patience of the mountain cat, which on 
the bare bough sits watching, from sunset 
until sunrise, motionless. In. the old days 
such gifts meant wisdom, wider, deeper, more 
exact than that of books, for so my mother 
often told me. She said the wisest men 
who ever lived were those who, in deep 
woods and caves and on the shore of seas, 
saw, heard, and pondered on the life and 



Il6 MA MELONS. 

mysteries of nature, noting all things, small 
and great, cause and effect, tracing out con- 
nections which interlace the parts into one 
whole, so making one solid woof of knowl- 
edge, covering all the world of fact and 
substance in the end. And once, when you 
were in the mood, and had been talking in 
the hall, drawn on and out by her, you told 
of climes and places you had seen, and 
strange things met in wandering, of great 
mounds builded by some ancient race, long 
dead ; of cities, under sunset, still standing 
solid, without men ; of tall and shapely pil- 
lars, writ with mystic characters, on the far 
shore of the mild sea, whence sailed the old 
dead of my race, at dying, far away to west- 
ern heavens, where to-day they live ; of 
caverns in deep earth, made glorious with 



MAMELONS. II7 

crystals, stalactites, prisms, and shining orna- 
ments, where, in old time the gods of 
the under world were chambered ; of trees 
that mingled bloom and fruitage the long 
year through, and flowers that never faded 
till the root died out ; of creeping reptiles, 
snakes, and savage poisonous things that 
struck to kill, and of their antidotes, grow- 
ing for man and beast amid the very grasses 
where they secreted venom ; of rivers wide 
and deep, boiling up through solid earth, 
full-tided, which, flowing widely on, dropped 
suddenly like a plummet to the centre of 
the world ; of plains, fenced by the sky, far 
reachine as the level sea, so that the red sun 
rose and set in grasses ; of fires which, lit 
by lightning, blackened the stars with smoke 
and burned aU the world ; of oceans in the 



Il8 MAMELONS. 

west, which, flowing with joint floods, fell 
over mountains, plunging their weights of 
water sheer downward, so that the rocky 
framework of the round earth shook ; of 
winds that blew as out of chaos, revolving 
on a hollow axis like a wheel buzzing, Invis- 
ible, charged to the centre with electric force, 
and fires which burst explosive, kindling the 
air like tinder ; and of ten thousand mar- 
vels and curious things, which you have met, 
noted, and pondered on, seeking to know 
the primal fact or force which underlaid 
them. So that my mother said that night, 
when we were in our chamber, that you were 
the wisest man she ever met ; wise with the 
wisdom of her ancient folk, whose knowl- 
edge lived, oral and terse, before the habit 
of bookmaking came to rive the solid sub- 



MAMELONS. II9 

Stance, heavy and rich, into thin veneer, to 
make vain show for fools to wonder at. 
Teach me ! Who might thou not teach, 
thou seeing, silent man, type of my first 
fathers, who, gifted with rare senses and with 
wit to question nature and to learn mastered 
all wisdom before books were." 

''Aye, aye," returned the Trapper, not dis- 
pleased to hear her praise as rare what 
seemed to him so common, '' these things 
I know In truth, for I have wandered far, 
seen much, and noted closely, and he who 
sleeps In woods has time to think. But, 
girl, I am an unlearned man, and know 
naught of books." 

*' Books ! " exclaimed the girl. *' What are 
books but oral knowledge spread out In 
words which lack the fire of forceful utter- 



I20 MAMELONS. 

ance ? But you shall know them. The win- 
ter days are short, the nights are long ; our 
toil Is simple ; wood for the fire, food for 
the table, and a swift push each day along 
the snow for exercise ; or, if the winds will 
keep some acres clean, our skates shall ring 
to the smitten ice, piercing it with tremblings 
till all the shores cry out. All other hours 
for sleep and books. I read in seven 
tongues, one so old that none save I in all 
the world can read it ; for it was writ when 
letters were a mystery, known only unto 
those who fed the sacred fire and kept God's 
altars warm. And I will read you all the 
wisdom of the world, and Its rare lauorhter, 
which, mother said, was the fine effervesce 
of wisdom, the pungent foam and sparkle 
of It. So you shall know. And one old 



MAMELONS. 121 

scroll there is, rolled in foil of gold, sealed 
with the serpent seal, symbol of eternity, 
scribed with pictured knowledge, an heirloom 
of my race, whose key alone I have, writ in 
rainbow colors, when the world was young, 
the lanofuaee of the eods, who first made 
signs for speech and put the speaking mouth 
upon a page. It was the first I learned. My 
mother taught it to me standing at her knee 
— for so the law says it shall be done, a 
law old with twice ten thousand years of 
age — that he who know^s this scroll shall 
teach it, under silence, to his or her first 
born, standing at knee, that the old knowl- 
edge of prime things and days may not 
perish from the earth it tells of, but live on 
forever while the earth endures. For on it 
is the record of the beginning, told by those 



122 MA MELONS. 

who saw it ; of the first man and how he 
came to be ; of woman, first, when born and 
of what style. A hst of heahng simples, 
antidotes 'gainst death, and of rare oils which 
search the bones and members of the mor- 
tal frame and banish pain ; and others yet, 
sweet to the nose, and volatile, that make 
the face to shine, for feasts and happy days, 
and being poured on women, make their skin 
softer than down, whiter than drifted snow, 
and so clean and clear that the rich blood 
pinks through it like a red rose centred in 
crystal. And on it, too, is written other and 
strange rules, wild and weird. How one 
may have the seeing eye come to him. 
How to call up the wicked dead from under 
ground, and summon from their heaven in 
the west, where they live and love, the 



MAMELONS. 1 23 

blessed. How marriaore came to man with 
woman. What part is his to act and what 
part hers, that each may be a joy to other, 
and she thus honored, be as sweet shp 
grafted on a vital trunk, full flowered in full- 
est growth, and fruitful of what the old gods 
loved, children, healthy, fair, and strong ; all 
wall I read thee, talking as w^e read, that w^e, 
with sharpened thought, may bite through to 
the vital gist, deep centred within the hard 
rind of words, and taste the living sw^eetness 
of true sense. So will we teach each other 
and grow wise equally ; you, me the knowl- 
edge of things and places you have seen ; 
I, you the knowledge writ in books that I 
hav-e read." 



CHAPTER IV. 



LOVES VICTORY. 



TV TEXT day, the Trapper's sign proved true. 

Winter fell whitely on the world. Its 

soft fleece floated downward to the earth 

whiter than washed wools. The waters of the 

lake blackened in contrast to the shores. The 

flying leaves — tardy vagrants from the branch 

— were smothered 'mid the flakes, and dropped 

like shot birds. Toward night the wind arose. 

The forest moaned. At sunset, in the gray 

gloom, a flock of ducks roared southward 

through the whirling storm. A field of geese, 

leaderless, bewildered, blinded by the driving 

flakes, scented water, and, like a noisy mob, 

124 



MAMELOAS. 1 25 

fell, with a mighty splash, into the lake. 
Summer went with the day, and with the 
night came winter, white, cold, and stormy, 
roaring violently through the air. 

In the great hall sat the two. The Ioq-s 
on the wide hearth piled high, glowed red 
— a solid coal from end to end, cracked with 
concentric rings. They reddened the hall, 
books, skins, and andered trophies of the 
chase. The strong man and the girl's dark 
face stood forth in the warm luminance, pre- 
Raphaelite. The Trapper sat in a great chair, 
built solidly of rounded wood, untouched by 
tool, but softly cushioned. The girl, recum- 
bent, rested on a pile of skins, black with 
the glossy blackness of the bear, full furred. 
Her dress, a garnet velvet, from the looms 
of France. Her moccasins, snow white. On 



126 MA MELONS. 

either wrist a serpent coil of gold. A dia- 
mond at her throat. A red fez on her head, 
while over her rich dress the glossy masses 
of her hair fell tangled to her feet. She read 
from an old book, bound with rich plush, 
whose leaves were vellum, edged with artful 
garniture and lettered richly with crimson ink 
— a precious relic of old literature, saved from 
those vandal flames which burned the stored 
knowledge of the world to ashes at Alexan- 
dria. The characters were Phoenician, and 
told the story of that race to which we owe 
our modern alphabet ; whose ships, a thou- 
sand years before the Christ, went freighted 
with letters, seeking baser commerce, to every 
shore of the wide world. She read by the 
fire's red light, and the ruddy glow fell viv- 
idly on the pictured page, the rich dress out- 



MA MELONS. I 27 

lining her full form and the swarth beauty 
of her face. It was the story of an old race 
— no library has it now — the story of their 
rise, their glory, and their fall. She read for 
hours, pausing here and there to tell her lis- 
tener of connecting things — of Rome that 
was not then ; of Greece yet to be born ; of 
Egypt, swarming on the Nile and building 
monuments for eterjiity, and of her ancient 
race, west of the tideless sea, whose annals, 
even then, reached backward through ten 
thousand years, thus making clear what other- 
wise were dark, and teaching him all history. 
So passed the hours till midnight struck. 
Then she arose, and lifting goblet half-filled 
with water, poured it on the hearth, saying: 
" I spill this water to a race whose going 
emptied half the world." This solemnly, for 



128 MAMELONS. 

she was of the past, and held to its old fash- 
Ions, knowing all its symbolism, its rites, its 
daily customs, and what they meant, for so 
she had been taught, and nothing else, by 
her whose blood and beauty she repeated. 
Then took the Trapper's hand and laid it on 
her head, bent low, and said : " Dear friend, 
I am so glad to serve you. I have enjoyed 
this night beyond all nights I ever knew. I 
hope for many others like to it, and even 
sweeter." And saying this she looked with 
glad and peaceful eyes into his face, and 
glided noiselessly from the room. 

The Trapper piled high the logs again, 
and, lying down upon the skins where she 
had lain, gazed with wide eyes into the coals. 
The gray was in the sky before he slept, and 
in his sleep he murmured: "It cannot be. I 



MA MEL ONS. 1 2 9 

am an unlearned man and poor. I am not 
fit." Above him in her chamber, nestHng in 
sleep, the girl sighed in her dreams and 
murmured; "How blind he is!" And then: 
" My love shall win him ! " 

Dear girl, sweet soul of womanhood, gift 
to these gilded days from the old solid past, 
I would the thoucrht had never come to me 
to tell this tale of Mamelons ! 

So went the w^inter ; and so the two erew 
upward side by side in knowledge. He 
learning of the past as taught in books ; 
of men long dead whose names had been un- 
known to him ; of deeds done by the mighty 
of the world ; of cities, monuments, tombs 
long buried ; of races who mastered the world 
and died mastered by their own weaknesses ; 
of faiths, philosophies, and creeds once bright 



130 MAMELONS. 

and strong as fire, now cold and weak as 
sodden ashes ; of vanished rites and mysteries 
and lost arts which once were the world's 
wonder — all were unfolded to him, so that 
his strong mind grasped the main point of 
each and understood the whole. And she 
learned much from him ; of bird and beast 
and fish ; of climates and their growths ; of 
rocks and trees ; of nature's signs and move- 
ments by day and night ; of wandering tribes 
and mongrel races ; the lore of woods and 
waters and the differences in crovernments 
which shape the lives of men. So taught 
they each the other ; she, swift of thought 
and full of eastern fire ; he, slower minded, 
but calm, sagacious, comprehensive, remem- 
bering all and settling all in wise conclusion. 
Two better halves, in mind and soul and 



MA MELONS. I ^ I 



body, to make a perfect whole, were never 
brought by fate together since God made 
male and female. The past and present, fire 
and wood, fancy and judgment, beauty to 
win and strength to hold, sound minds in 
sound bodies, the perfect w^omanhood and man- 
hood ideal, typical, met, conjoined in them. 

Slowly she won him. Slowly she drew 
him, with the innocence of loving, to one- 
ness in wish and thought and feeling, with 
her sweet self. Slowly, as the moon lifts 
the great tide, she lifted him toward her, 
until his nature stood highest, full flooded, 
nigh, bathed in all the wide, deep flowing of 
its greatness, in her white radiance. It was 
an angel's mission, and all the wild passion 
of her blood, original, barbaric, was sobered 
with reverent thought of the great destiny 



132 MAMELONS. 

that she, wedded to hnn, stood heir to. She 
had no other hope, nor wish, nor dream, than 
to be his. She was all woman. This life was 
all to her. She had no future. If she had, 
she wisely put It by until she came to It. She 
took no thought of far to-morrow. Sufficient 
for the day was the joy or sorrow of It. She 
lived. She loved. That was enough. What 
more might be to woman than to live, to 
love, worship her husband and bear children ? 
Such life were heaven. If other heaven there 
were she could not crave It, belnor satisfied. 
So felt she. So had she felt. So acted that 
It might be ; and now, at last, she stood on 
that white line each perfect woman climbs 
to, passing which, radiant, content, grateful, 
she enters — heaven. 



MAMELONS. T33 

Spring came. Heat touched the snow, and 
it grew Hquid. The hills murmured as with 
many tongues, and low music flowed rippling 
down their sides. The warm earth sweetened 
with odors. Sap stirred in root and bough, 
and the fibred sod thrilled with delicious pas- 
sages of new life. 

From the far South came flaming plumage, 
breasts of gold and winged music to the 
groves. The pent roots of herbs, spiced and 
pungent, burst upward through the moistened 
mould, and breathed wild, gamy odors through 
the woods. The skeleton trees thickened with 
leaf formations, and hid their naked grayness 
under green and gold. Each day birds of 
passage, pressed by parental instinct, slanted 
wings toward the lake, and, sailing inward, 
to secluded bays, made haste to search for 



134 MAMELONS. 

nests. Mother otters swam heavy through 
the tide, and the great turtles, lumbering from 
the water, digged deep pits under starlight, 
in the sand, and cunningly piled their pyra- 
mid of eggs. All nature loved and mated, 
each class of life in its own order, and God 
began the re-creation of the world. 

The two were standing under leafy screen 
on the lake's shore, the warm sun overhead 
and the wide water lying level at their feet. 
Nature's mood w^as on them, and their 
hearts, like equal atmospheres, flowed to 
sweet union. Reverently they spoke, as soul 
to soul, concealing nothing, having nothing 
to conceal, of their deep feeling and of duty 
unto each. The girl held up her clean, sweet 
nature unto him, that he might see it, w^holly 
his forever ; and he kept nothing back. She 



MAMELONS, 1 35 

knew he loved her, and to her the task to 
make him feel the honor she received in 
being loved by him. So stood they, alone 
in the deep woods, apart from men, in grave, 
sweet counsel. Thus spake the man : 

"I love you, Atla ; you know it. I would 
lay down my life for you. But our marriage 
may not be. I am too old." 

*'Too old!" replied the girl. ''Thou hast 
seen forty years, I twenty. Thou art the 
riper, sweeter, better ; that is all. I would 
not wed a boy. The women of our race 
have wedded men, big bodied, strong to 
fight, to save, to make home safe, their coun- 
try free, and fame, that richest heritage to 
children. My mother broke the rule, and 
rued it. She might have rued it worse had 
death not cut the tightening error which 



136 MA MELONS. 

knotted her to coming torture. My heart 
holds hard to the old law made for the 
women of our race by ancient wisdom ; 
' Wed not boys, but wed grave and gentle 
men. For women would be ruled, and who, 
of pride and fire, would be ruled by strip- 
lings ? ' And again : ' Let ivy seek the full- 
grown oak, nor cling to saplings.' I love 
the laws that were, love the old faiths and 
customs. They filled the w^orld with beauty 
and brave men. They gave great nature 
opportunity to keep great, kept noble blood 
from base, strength from wedding weakness, 
and barred out mongrelism from the world, 
which in the ancient days was deadliest sin, 
corrupting all. O love! you do mistake, 
saying ' I am too old.' For women have 
ever the child's habit In them. They love 



MAMELONS. I37 

to be held in arms, love to look up to lov- 
ing eyes, love to be commanded, and obey 
strong sovereignty. The husband is head — 
head of the house. He sits in wide au- 
thority, and from his wisdom flow counsel, 
command, which all the house, wife, children, 
and servants, bend to, obedient. How can 
a stripling fill such seat ? How sit such dig- 
nity on a beardless face ? How, save from 
seasoned strength, such safety come to all ? 
O full grown man ! be oak to me, and let 
me twine my weakness round thy strength, 
that I may find safe lodgment, nor be shaken 
in my roots when storms blow strong. Too 
old ! I would thy head were sown with the 
white rime of added years. So should I 
love thee more ! " 

Ah me, such pleading from love's mouth. 



138 MA MELONS. 

such sweet entreaty from love's heart man 
never heard before, in these raw days, when 
callow youth is fondled by weak women, and 
boys with starting beards push wisdom, gray 
and grave, from council chairs. 
Then, in reply, the Trapper said : 
'' Ada, it cannot be. I will admit that 
you say, sooth, my years do not forbid. 
Boys are rash, hot-headed, quick of tongue, 
ill-mannered, lacking patience, just sense, and 
slow-mannered gentleness which comes with 
added years, and that deep knowledge which 
slows blood and gentles speech, and I do 
see that you fit well to these, and would be 
happier with a man thus charactered. But, 
letting that go by — and all my heart is 
grateful that it may — still marriage may not 
be between us, for thou art rich and I am 



MA MELONS. 1 39 

poor, and so It should not be. For husband 
should own house ; the wife make home. 
What say you, am I right or wrong?" 

To which the girl made answer: ''Thou art 
an old-time man, John Norton, and this judg- 
ment fits the ancient wisdom. For in the 
beorinninor so it was. The male built nest, 

o o 

the female feathered it with song. So each 
had part in common ministry. The man was 
greater, richer, than the w^oman, and w^ith 
earthly substance did endow. And she in 
turn gave sweet companionship, and sang 
loneliness from his life with mother songs 
and children's prattle. Thus in the begin- 
ning. Yea, thou art right, as thou art always 
right. For, being sound in heart and head, 
thou canst not err. Thy judgment goes 
straight to the centre of the truth as goes thy 



140 MAMELONS. 

bullet. But as men lived and died, change 
came to the first order. For men without 
male issue died and left great dower to girls. 
Women, by no fault of theirs, nor lack of 
modesty, grew rich by gifts of death, which 
are the gifts of fate. And changing circum- 
stance changed all, making the old law void. 
The gods pondered, and a new order rose. 
By chance, at first, then by ordainment, roy- 
alty left male and followed female blood, be- 
cause their blood was truer to itself, less 
vagrant, purer, better kept. And women of 
red blood and pure, clothed in royalty from 
shame, made alliances with men whom their 
souls loved, and gave rank, wealth, and their 
sweet selves in lavishness of loving, which 
gives all and keeps nothing back. Such was 
the habit of my race and line from age to 



MAMELOAS. 141 

age, even as I read you from the pictured 
scroll, rolled in foil of gold, that only I, of 
all the world, can read ; and if I die, leaving 
no child, the golden secret goes with me to 
the gods, and all the ancient lore is lost to 
men forever. This to assist your judgment 
and make the scales hang level from your 
hand for just decision. Am I to blame be- 
cause I stand as heir to ancient blood and 
wealth ? Shall these wide acres, gold in yon- 
der house, gems in casket, and diamonds 
worn for ten thousand years by women of 
my race, queens of the olden time, when in 
their hands they lifted world-wide sceptres, 
divide thee and me? Has love no weight in 
the just scales you, by the working of some 
old fate, I know not what, hold over me and 
my soul's wish to-day? Be just to your own 



142 MA MELONS. 

soul, be just to mine, and fling these doubts 
aside as settled forever by the mighty Power 
that works in darkness, and through darkness, 
to the light, shaping our fates and ordering 
life and death, joy and grief, beyond our 
power to fix or change. Blown by two winds, 
whose coming and going we list not, we, two, 
meet here. Strong art thou and I am weak, 
but shall thy strength repel my weakness? 
Rich, without fault, I am. My blood is older 
than these hills, purer than yonder water, and 
wilt thou make an accident, light as a feather 
in just balances, outweigh a fact sweet as 
heaven, heavy as fate ? The queens of old, 
whose blood is one with mine, who spake 
the self-same tongue and loved the self-same 
way, chose men to be their kings; so I, by 
the same law, choose thee. Be thou my king. 



MA MELONS. 1 43 

Rule me In love. By the old right and rule 
of all my race, I place thy hand upon my 
head, and so pass under yoke. I am thy 
subject, and all my days shall be a sweet 
subjection. Do with me as thou wilt. I 
make no terms. My feet shall w^alk with 
thine to the dark edge of death. Further I 
know not. This life we may make sure. The 
next Is or Is not ours to order. No man may 
say. Lord of my earthly life, take me, take 
me to thy arms, that I, last of an old race, 
last of Its blood, left sole in all the world, with- 
out father, mother, friend, may feel I am be- 
loved by him I worship, and drink one glad, 
sweet cup before I go to touch the bitter 
edge of dubious chance at Mamelons." 

Then love prevailed. Doubt w^ent from 
out his soul. His nature, unrestrained. 



144 MAMELONS. 

leaped up in a red rush of joy to eyes and 
face. He lifted hands and opened arms to 
her. To them she swept, as bird into safe 
thicket, chased by hawk, with a glad cry. 
Panting she lay upon his bosom, trembling 
through all her frame, placed mouth to his 
and lost all sense but feeling. Then, with a 
gasp, drew back and lifted dewy eyes to his, 
as fed child to nursing mother's face, or saint 
her worshiping gaze to God. 

But the gods of her old race, standing 
beyond su?iset, lifted high, saw, farther on, 
the saiidy slope of Manielons, and, ivhile 
she lay in heaven on her lover s breast, they 
bent low their heads and wept. 

Spring multiplied Its days and growths. 
Night followed night as star follows star in 



MAMELONS. 1 45 

their far circuits, wheeling forever on. Each 
morn brought sweet surprise to each. For 
Hke the growths of nature so grew their love 
fuller with bloom each morn ; with fragrance 
fuller each dewy night. Her nature, under 
love's warmth, grew richer, seeding at its 
core for sweeter, larger life. His borrowed 
tone and color from her own, and fragrance. 
So, in the happy days of the long spring, 
as earth grew warmer, sweeter with the days, 
the two grew, with common growth and 
closer, until they stood in primal unity, no 
longer twain, but one. 

One day she came, and put her hand in 
his and said : 

*' Dear love, there is an old rite by which 
my people married. It bindeth to the 
grave ; no farther. For there the old faith 



146 MA MELONS. 

Stopped, not knowing what life might be 
beyond, or by whom ordered. Thine goeth 
on through death as Hght through darkness, 
and holds the hope that earthly union lasts 
forever. It may be so. Perhaps the Gali- 
lean knew better than the gods what is with- 
in the veil, for so the symbol is. It is a 
winning faith. My heart accepts it as a happy 
chance ; and, did it not, it would not matter. 
Thy faith is mine, and thine shall be my 
God. Perchance the ancient deities and your 
modern One are but the same, with different 
names. We worshiped ours with fruits and 
flowers and incense ; with dancing feet, glad 
songs, and altars garlanded with flowers ; 
moistened with wine ; you, yours with dole- 
ful music, bare rites, the beggary of petition 
and cold reasoning. Ours was the better 



MAMELONS. 1 47 

fashion, for It kept the happy habits up of 
children, gladly grateful for father gifts, and 
so prolonged the joyous childhood of the 
world. But in this thy faith is better — it 
hangs a star above the tide of death for love 
to steer by. My heart accepts the sign. 
Thy faith is mine. We will go down to 
Mamelons, and there be married by the holy 
man who wears upon his breast the sign 
you trust to." 

*' Nay, nay ; it shall not be," exclaimed 
the Trapper. " Ada, thou shalt not go to 
Mamelons. There waits the doom for the 
mixed blood. There died thy father, and 
all its sands are full of moldering men. We 
will be married here by the old custom of 
thy people, and God, who looketh at the 
heart and knoweth all, will bless us." 



148 MA MELONS. 

" Dear love," returned the girl, " thy word 
is law to me. I have no other. It shall be 
as thou wilt. But listen to my folly or my 
wisdom, I know not which it is : I fear not 
Mamelons. There is no coward blood in 
me. The women of our race face fate with 
open eyes. So it has been from the begin- 
ning. Death sees no pallor in our cheeks. 
To love we say farewell, then grave ward go 
with steady steps. The women of my house 
— a lengthy line, stretching downward from 
the past beyond annals — whose blood flows 
red in me, lived queens, and, dying, died as 
they lived. I would die so ; lest, if thy faith 
is true, they would not own me kin nor give 
me place among them when I came, if I 
feared fate or death. Besides, the doom may 
not hold good toward me. I know my uncle 



MA MELONS. 1 49 

saw the sight ; but he was only Tortoise, a 
branch blown far from the old tree and lost 
a thousand years amid strange peoples, and 
his sight could not, therefore, be sure. 
Moreover, love, if the curse holds, and I am 
under doom, how may I escape ? For fate 
is fate, and he who runs, runs quickest 
into it. So let us go, I pray, to Mame- 
lons, and there be married by the holy man, 
the symbol ' on whose breast was known to 
our old race and carved on altars ten thou- 
sand years before the simple Jew was born 

^ The cross as a symbol is traceable through all the 
old races, even the remotest in point of time. It was 
originally a symbol of plenty and joy, and so stood 
emblematic of happiness for tens of thousands of years. 
The Romans connected it with their criminal law, as 
we have the gallows, and so it became a symbol of 
shame and sorrow. 



150 MA MELONS. 

at Bethlehem. So shall the symbol of the 
old faith and the new be for the first time 
kissed by two who represent the sunrise and 
the sunset of the world ; and the god of 
morning and of evening be proved to be the 
same, though worshiped under different names." 
He yielded, and the two made ready to 
set face toward Mamelons. 

There was, serving in her house, an old 
red servitor, who had been chief, in other 
days, of Mistassinni.' His dwindled tribe 

^ This lake lies to the northwest of Lake St. John some 
300 miles, and within some 200 miles of James' Bay. It 
was first discovered by white men in the person of 
*Pere Abanel, in 1661, a Jesuit missionary, en route to 
Hudson's Bay. This is the lake about which so much 
has been said in Canada and the States, and so much 
printed. In fact, very little is accurately known of it, 



MAMELONS, 151 

lives Still upon the lake which reaches north- 
ward beyond knowledge. But he, longer 
than her life, had lived in the great house, 

unless we assume that the Late survey by Mr. Low is 
to be regarded as a settlement of the matter — which 
few, if any, acquainted with the Mistassinni question 
would do. Having examined all the data bearing on 
the subject, I can but conclude that the bit of water 
which Mr. Low said he surveyed was only a small arm 
or branch of the lake reaching south from it, and that 
the Great Mistassinni itself was never seen by Mr. 
Low, much less surveyed. Unless we concluded with 
an ancient cynic that "All men are liars," then there 
surely is a vast body of water known to the natives 
as Big Mistassinni, lying in the wilderness several hun- 
dreds of miles from Hudson's Bay, yet to be visited 
and surveyed by white men. Mista, in Indian dialect, 
means great, and sinni means a stone or rock. And 
hence Mistassinni means the " Lake of Great Stones 
or Rocks." The Assinniboine, or Rocky River, Indians 
of the West were evidently of the same blood and lan- 
guage originally with these red men of the northern wilds. 



152 AT A MELONS. 

a life-long guest, but serving It In his wild 
fashion. Warring with Nasquapees and Moun- 
taineers against the Esquimaux, he had been 
overcome In ambush and in the centre of their 
camp put to the torture. Grimly he stood 
the test of fire, not making moan as their 
knives seamed him and the heated spear 
points seared. Maddened, one pried his jaws 
apart with edge of hatchet, and tore his 
tongue out, saying, in devilish jest, ''If thou 
wilt not talk, thou hast no need of this," and 
ate it before his eyes. Then the Chief, with 
twice a hundred braves, burst in upon them, 
and whirled the hellish brood, in roaring 
battle, out of the world. The Trapper, 
plunging through whirring hatchets and red 
spear points, sent the cursed fagots flying 
that blazed upward to his bloody mouth and 



MA MELONS. I 53 

SO saved him to the world. Crippled beyond 
hope of leadership, he left his tribe, and, 
toiling slowly through the woods, came to 
the Chief in the great house and said, in the 
quick language of silent signs : "I am no 
longer chief — I cannot fight. Let me stay 
here until I die." Thus came he, and so 
stayed, keeping, through many years, the 
larder full of game and fish. This wrinkled 
withered man went with them, paddling his 
birch slowly on, deep ladened with needed 
stuffs and precious things for dress and orna- 
ment at the marriage. For she said: ''I 
will put on the raiment of my race when my 
foremothers reigned o'er half the world, and 
their banners, w^oven of cloth of gold, dark, 
with an emerald island at the centre, waved 
over ships which bore the trident at their 



154 MAMELONS, 

bows, their sailors anchored under Mamelons 
a thousand and a thousand years before Spain 
sprang a mushroom from the old Iberian 
mold. I will stand or fall forever, Queen at 
Mamelons." So said she, and so meant. For 
all her blood thrilled with the haughty cour- 
age of that past, when fate was faced with 
open, steady eyes, and the god Death, that 
moderns tremble at, was met by men who 
gazed into his gloomy orbs with haughty 
stare as he came blackening on. vSo silently 
the silent man went on in his light bark, 
loaded with robes, heavy with flowered gold, 
woven of old in looms whose soft movements, 
going deftly to and fro, sound no more, leav- 
ing no ripple as it went, steered by his 
withered hands, down the black rivers of the 
north, toward feast or funeral under Mamelons. 



CHAPTER V. 



AT MAMELONS. 



OUMMER was at its hottest. The woods, 
^^ sweltering under heavy heat, sweat odors 
from every gummy pore. Flowers, unless 
water-rooted, withered on their stalks. The 
lumbering moose came to the streams and 
stayed. The hot hills drove him down. The 
feathered mothers of the streams led down 
their downy progeny to wider waters. The 
days were hot as ovens and the nights dew- 
less. The soft sky hardened and shone 
brazen from pole to pole. The poplar leaves 
shrank from their trembling twigs and the 
birches shriveled in the heat. But on the 



156 MA MELONS. 

livers the air was moist and cool, lily-sweet- 
ened, and above their heads, at night, the yel- 
low stars swung in their courses like golden 
globes, large, soft, and round. So the two 
boats went on through lovely lakes, floating 
slowly down the flowing rivers without hap 
or hazard, till they came to the last portage, 
beyond which flowed the Stygian' river, whose 
gloomy tide flows out of death into bright 
life at Mamelons. 

They took the shortest trail. Straight up 
It ran over the mighty ridge which down- 
w^ard slopes on the far side, eastward to that 

^ The waters of the Saguenay are unlike those of 
any other river known. They are a purple-brown, and, 
looked at en masse, are, to the eye, almost black. This 
peculiar color gives it a most gloomy and grewsome look, 
and serves to vastly deepen the profound impression its 
other peculiar characteristics make upon the mind. 



MAMELONS. 1 57 

Strange bay men call Eternity. It was an 
old trail only ran by runners who ran for 
life and death when war blazed suddenly and 
tribes were summoned in hot haste to rally. 
But she was happy hearted, and, half jesting, 
half in earnest, said : " Take the short trail. 
My heart is like a bird flying long kept from 
home. Let me ^o straiofht." So on the trail 
the two men toiled all day, while she played 
with the sands upon the shore and crowned 
herself with lilies, saying: "The queens of 
my old line loved lilies. I will have lily at 
my throat when I am wed." 

So, when night had come, the boats and all 
their lading were on the other side, and they 
were on the ridge, which sloped either way, 
the sunset at their backs, the gloomy gorge 
ahead. Then, pausing on the crest, swept 



158 MAMELONS. 

to its rocks by rasping winds, the sunset at 
her back, the gloom before, she said: "Here 
will we bivouac. The sky is dewless, and the 
air is cool. The trail from this runs easy 
down. I would start with sunrise on my 
face toward Mamelons." 

So was it done, and they made camp be- 
neath the trees, a short walk from the ridge, 
where the great spruce stood thickly, and a 
spring boiled upward through the gravel, cold 
as ice. 

The evening passed like a sweet song 
through dewy air. She was so full of health, 
so richly gifted, so happy in her heart, so 
nigh to wedded life with him she worshipped, 
that her soul was full of joyousness, as the 
lark's throat, soaring skyward, is of song. 
She chattered like a magpie in many tongues. 



MA MELONS. 1 59 

translating rare old bits of foreign wit and 
ancient mirth with apt and laughable grim- 
aces. Her face was mobile, rounding with 
jollity or lengthening with woe at will. She 
had the light foot and the pliant limb, the 
superb pose, abandon, and the languishing 
repose of her old race, whose princesses, with 
velvet feet, tinkling ankles, and forms volup- 
tuous, lithe as snakes, danced before kings 
and won kingdoms with applause from those 
whom, by their wheeling, swaying, flashing 
beauty, they made wild. She danced the 
dances of the East, when dancing was a lan- 
guage and a worship, with pantomime so rare 
and eloquent that the pleased eye translated 
every motion, as the ear catches the quick 
speech. Then sang she the old songs of 
buried days, sad, wild, and sweet as love sing- 



l6o MAMELO^S. 

ing at death's door to memory and to hope ; 
the song oC joys departed and of joys to 
come. So passed the evening till the eastern 
stars, wheeling upward, stood in the zenith. 
Then with lingering lips she kissed her lover 
on the mouth, and on her couch of frao^rant 
boughs fell fast asleep, forgetful of all things 
but life and love ; murmuring softly in her 
happy dreams, ''To-morrow night," and after 
a little space, again, " Sweet, sweet to- 
morrow ! " 

But all the long evening through, the old 
tongueless chief of measureless Mistassinni 
sat as an Indian sits when death is coming — 
back straightened, face motionless, and eyes 
fixed on vacancy. Not till the girl lay sleep- 
ing on the boughs did he stir muscle. Then 
he rose up, and with dilating nostrils tested 



MAMELONS. l6l 

the air, and his throat rattled. Then put his 
ear to earth, as man to wall, listening to the 
voices running through the framework of the 
world,' cast cones upon the dying brands, 
and, standing in the light made by the gummy 
rolls, said to the Trapper in dumb show : 
" The dead are moving. The earth cracks 
beneath the leaves. The old trail is filled 
W4th warriors hurrying eastward out of death. 
Their spears are slanted as when men fly. 

^ I have been often surprised at the many and strange 
sounds which ma}' at times be heard by putting the ear 
flat to the sod or to the barlv of trees. Even the sides of 
rocks are not dumb, but often resonant with noises — of 
running waters, probably — deep within. It would seem 
that every formation of matter had, in some degree, the 
characteristics of a whispering gallery, and that, were our 
ears only acute enough, we might hear all sounds moving 
in the world. 



1 62 MAMELONS. 

They wave us downward toward the river. 
Call her you love from dreamland and let 
us go." 

To which the Trapper, answering, signed : 
*' Chief, old age is on you, and the memory 
of old fights. 'Tis always so with you red 
men.' The old fields stir you, and here upon 
this ridge we fought your fight of rescue. 
God ! what a rush we made ! The air was 
full of hatchets as of acorns under shaken 
oaks when I burst throuo^h. I kicked an old 
skull under moss as we halted here, that she 
might not see it. It lies under that yellow 
tuft. 1 have ears, and I tell you nothing 

^ It is said that Indians cannot sleep upon a battle- 
field, however old, because of superstitious fear. They 
admit themselves that it is not well to do it, and always, 
under one excuse or another, avoid doing so. 



MA MELONS. 163 

Stirs. It is your superstition, chief. Neither 
Hving nor dead have passed to-night.. A 
man without cross knows better. I will wait 
here till dawn. She said ' I would see sun- 
rise in my face when I start for Mamelons,' 
and she shall. I have said." 

To this the chief, after pause, signed back : 
*' I have stood the test, and from the burn- 
ing stake went beyond flesh. I have seen 
the dead, and know them. I say the dead 
have passed to-night. Even as she danced 
her happy dances, and you laughed, I saw 
them crowd the ridee and come, filing^ down- 
ward. They fled with slanted spears. You 
know the sign. It was a warning, and for 
us and her. For, with the rest, headinof the 
line, there walked two chiefs whose bosoms 
bore the Tortoise sign. I knew them. They 



164 MAMELONS. 

slanted spears at her, and waved us down ; 
then ghded on at speed. And others yet I 
saw, not of my race — a woman floating in 
the air, her mother, clothed as she shall be 
to-morrow, and with her a long line of faces, 
like to hers asleep, save eager looking, anx- 
ious ; and they, too, waved us downward to- 
ward the river. This is no riddle. Trapper. 
It is plain. When do the dead move without 
cause ? Awake your bride from dreams and 
come down. Some fate is flying with flat 
wings this way, I know not what. I only 
know the dead have waved me toward water, 
and I ofo." 

So saying, he took the dark trail downward, 
and in the darkness disappeared. 

" The spell is on him," muttered the Trap- 
per, as he sodded the brands, " and naught 



MA MELONS. 1 65 

may stop him. The old fool will do some 
stumbling on the trail before his moccasins 
touch sand." And saying this, he gently 
kissed the sleeping girl, and taking her 
small hand in his strong palm, he fell asleep ; 
sleeping upon the crumbling edge of fate 
and death, not knowing. Had he but known ! 
Then might wedding bells, not wail, have 
sounded over Mamelons. 

''Awake! aw a he! my God^ the fire is on 
us, Atla!'' so roared he, standing straight. 

Up sprang she, quick as a flash, and stood 
in the red light by his side, cool, collected, 
while with swift, steady hands, she clothed 
herself for flight. Then swept with haughty 
glance the flaming ridge and said : " The 
light that lights my way to Mamelons, my 



1 66 MAMELONS. 

love, is hotter than sunrise ; but we may 
head it." Then, with him, turned, and fled with 
rapid, but sure, feet down the smoking trail. 

The fire was that old one which burnt 
itself into the memories of men so it became 
a birthmark, and thus was handed down to 
generations.' None knew how kindled. It 
first flared westward of the shallow lake, 
where Mistassinni empties its brown waters 
from the north, and at the first flash flamed 
to the sky. It is a mystery to this day, for 
never did fire kindled in woods or era-ss run 
as it ran. It raced a race of death with 

^ It has been told me that many children born 
after the terrible conflagration that had swept the 
forest from west of Lake St. John to Chicoutimi, and 
which ran a course of 150 miles in less than seven 
hours, were marked, at birth, as with fire. 



MAMELONS. 1 67 

every living thing ahead of it, and won against 
the swiftest foot of man or moose. The 
v/hirring partridge, buzzing on for hfe, tum- 
bled, featherless, a lump of singed, palpitat- 
ing flesh, into the ashes. The eagle, circling 
a mile from earth, caught in the rising vor- 
tex of hot air, shrunk like a feather touched 
by heat, and, lessening as he dropped, 
reached earth a cinder. The living were 
cremated as they crouched in terror or fled 
screaming. The woods were hot as hell. 
Trees, wet mosses, sodden mold, brook's, 
springs, and even rivers, disappeared. Rocks 
cracked like cannon overcharged. The face 
of cliffs slid downward or fell off with 
crashes like split thunder. It was a fire as 
hot, as fierce, as those persistent flames 
which melt the solid core of the world. 



1 58 MAMELONS. 

Downward they raced in equal flight. Her 
foot was as the fawn's ; his stride Hke that 
of moose. She bounded on. He swept 
along, o'er all. They spake no word save 
once. She slipped. He plucked her from 
the ground, and said : '' Brave one, we'll win 
this race — speed on." She flashed a bright 
look back to him and flew faster. Thus, over 
boulders and round rocks, they sprang and 
ran. Above, the flying sheets of flame ; be- 
hind, the red consuming line ; around them, 
the horrid crackling of shriveling leaves ; 
ahead, the water, nigh to which they were ; 
when, suddenly, they ran into blinding smoke 
and lost the trail, and, tearing onward, with- 
out sight, she fell and, striking a sharp rock, 
lay still, numbed to weakness. The Trapper, 
stumbling after, fell prone beside her, but 



MAMELONS, 1 69 

his strong frame stood the hard shock, and 
staggered upward. He felt for her, and 
found her hmp. She knew his touch and 
murmured faintly, with clear tones: "Dear 
love, stay not for me : go on and live. Atla 
knows how to die." 

He snatched her to his breast and throuo-h 
his teeth, '' O God! have yoic no mercy f 
then plunged onward, running slanting up- 
ward, for the smoke was thick below, and 
he knew the trees erew stunted on the cliffs. 
He ran like madman. A saint running out 
of hell might not run swifter. He was in 
hell, the hell of fire ; with heaven, the 
heaven of cool, reviving water, just ahead. 
The strength of ten was in him, and it sent 
his body, with her body on his breast, onward 
like a ball. His hair crimped to the black 



170 MA MELONS. 

roots of it. He felt it not. His skin blis- 
tered on cheek and hands. He only strained 
her closer to his bosom and tore on. With 
garments blazing, he whirled onward up the 
slope, streamed like a burning arrow along 
the ridge which edges the monstrous rock 
men call Cape Trinity, slid, tumbled, fell, 
down its smoking slope, until he came to 
where the awful front drops sheer ; then, 
heaving up his huge frame, still clasping 
her sweet weight within strong arms, plunged, 
like a burnt log rolling out of fire, into the 
dark, deep, blessed tide. 

Morn came, but brought no sunrise. 
Smoke, black and dense, filled the great 
gorge, and hung pulseless over the charred 
mountains. Soot scummed the water levels, 



MAMELONS. 17I 

and new brooks, flowing in new channels, 
tasted like lye. Smells of a burnt world 
filled the air. The nose shrank from breath, 
and breathed expectant of offence. The fire 
brought death to ten thousand living things, 
and filled all the waste with stench of shal- 
low graves, burnt skins, and smoldering bones. 
The dead had saved the living, for the old 
chief lived. From the red beach he saw the 
Trappers race for life along the smoking 
ridge, and paddled quick to where he made 
his awful, headlong plunge into Eternity.' 
From the deep depths he rose, like a dead 
fish to surface, his breath beaten out of him, 
but clasping still in tight arms the muffled 

^ The recess of water curving inward toward the 
mountains between Cape Trinity and Eternity is called 
Eternity Bay. 



172 MAMELONS. 

form. His tongueless savior — so paying life 
with life, the old debt wiped out at last — 
towed him to shore and on the beach revived 
him with rude skill persistent. He came to 
sense with violence, torn convulsively. His 
soul woke facing- backward, living past life 
again. To feet he sprang at his first breath, 
and cried: ''Awake! awake! my God, the 
fire is on tis, Atla!'' then plucked her from 
the sand where she lay, weak, as a wilted 
flower, and started with a bound to fly. The 
touch of her bent form, drooping in his arms, 
recalled his soul to sense, and he knew all, 
and reeled with the woe of it. Down at the 
water's edo^e he sank, cast coverinor cloth from 
head and hands, bathed her dark face, and 
murmured loving words to her still soul. 
Through realms and spaces of deep trance 



MA MELONS. I 73 

her spirit, lingering in dim void 'twixt life 
and death, heard love's call, and struggled 
back toward the shore of life and sense. 
From pulseless breast her soul clomb up, 
pushed the fringed lids apart, and gazed, 
through wide eyes of sweet surprise, upon 
his worshiped face : then sank, leaving a 
smile upon her lips, wathin the safe inclosure 
of deep sleep. All day she slept within his 
arms. All night she slumbered on. Wisely 
he waited, saying: ''Sleep to the overtaxed 
means life. It is the only medicine, and sure. 
In sleep the wearied find new selves." 

But when the second morning after starless 
night came to the world, she felt the waking 
gray of it upon her lids, and, stirring in his 
arms, like wounded bird in nest, moved mouth 
and opened eyes, and gazed slowly round, as 



174 MAMELONS. 

seeking knowledge of place and time and cir- 
cumstance. Then memory came, and she re- 
membered all, and softly said, " Art thou 
alive, dear love ? I have been with the dead. 
The dead were very kind, but oh, I missed 
you so," and with soft hand she stroked his 
face caressingly. The old chief mutely stood, 
watching, with gloomy eyes, the sad sight. 
He read the motion of her lips, and in his 
tongueless throat there grew a moan, and 
his dry lids wet themselves with tears. She 
noticed him and said : " You, too, alive, old 
servitor ! The gods are strict, but merciful. 
Two of the three remain. The one alone 
must go. So is it well." Then to her wor- 
shiped one: "Dear love, this is a gloomy 
place. Let us go on. The smoke hides the 
bright world. I long for light. The fate is 



MAMELONS. 1 75 

not yet sure. The blood of our old race 
holds tightly to last chance. We face it out 
with death to the last throb. Then yield, not 
sooner. Who knows ? I may find sunrise 
yet at Mamelons." 

So was it done. 

They placed her on soft skins within the 
boat facinor him who steered, for she said : 
*' Dear love, the dead see not the living. If 
I go I may not see you evermore. So let 
me look on your dear face while yet I may. 
To-day is mine. To-morrow — I know not 
who may own to-morrow." 

Thus, he at stern and she at stem, softly 
placed on the piled skins, her dark eyes on 
his face, they glided out of the deep bay, 
round the gray base of the dread cape that 
stands eternal, and floated downward with the 



176 MAMELONS. 

black ebb toward the sea. Past islands and 
through channels intricate, they went in si- 
lence, until they came to where the Margue- 
rite, with tuneful mouth, runs singing over 
shining sands, pouring out into dark Sague- 
nay, as life pours into death ; then breathed 
they freer airs, and the freshness of untainted 
winds fell sweetly down upon them from over- 
hanging hills, and thus she spake : 

"Dear love, I know not what may be. We 
mortals are not sure of anything. The end 
of sense is that of knowledge. We know we 
live forever. For so our pride compels, and 
some have seen the dead movinor. But under 

o 

what conditions we do live beyond, we know 
not. Hence hate I death. It is an interrup- 
tion and a stoppage of plans and joys which 
work and flow in sequence ; severs us from 



MAMELOAS. • ^77 

loved connections ; for the certain gives us 
the uncertain, and in place of solid substantial 
facts forces us to build our future lives on the 
unfixed and changeful foundations of hopes 
and dreams. It is not moral state that puz- 
zles. We of the old race never worried over 
that. For we knew if we were good enough 
to live here, and once, then w^e w^ere good 
enough to live elsewhere and forever ; but it 
was the nature of existence, its environment, 
and the connections orrowinof out of these that 
filled the race whose child I am with dread 
and dole. For all the women of my race 
loved with great loves — the loves of lovers 
who sublimated life in loving, and knew no 
higher and no holier, nor cared to know. We 
cast all on that one chance ; wanning all in 
winning, and losing all if we lost. With me 



178 MAMELONS, 

it is the same. I love you with a love that 
maketh life. I am a slave to it. It is my 
strength or weakness, as has been with the 
women of my blood from the beginning. I 
have no other creed, nor faidi nor hope. To- 
day I see thee, and I have. To-morrow whom 
shall I see ? The dead ? I care not for the 
dead. There is not one among them I may 
love, for loving thee has cut me off from 
loving other one forever ; unless the alchemy 
of death works back the creative process, un- 
doinL^ all of blood and nature, and sends us 
into nothingness, then brings us forth by new 
processes foreign to what we were, and wholly 
different from our old selves, which is a con- 
summation horrible to think of." 

'' Nay, nay," exclaimed the Trapper. " Such 
cannot be. Our loves, if they be large and 



MAMELONS. 1 79 

whole, grow with us, and with our Hves Hve 
on forever." 

*' It may be so, dear love," replied the girl. 
" Love's prophecy should be true as sweet, or 
else your sacred books are vain. For in them 
it is written, ' Love is of God.' But oh, how 
shall I find thee in that other world ? For 
wide and dim must stretch its spaces, and 
vast must be its intervals. This earth is 
small. We who live on it, few. Within the 
circle of three generations all living stand. 
But the dead are many. The sands of Mam- 
elons are not so numberless. They totalize 
the ages ; the land they dv/ell in beyond mor- 
tal compass. Who may be sure of meeting 
any one in such a realm ? At what point 
on its boundaries shall I wait and watch ? 
How signal thee, by hand or voice, when out 



l8o MAMELONS. 

of earth, like feather, blown, by that strange 
movement men call death. Into the endless 
distances, thou comest suddenly. Alas! alas! 
I know not if beyond this day, I, going out 
of this dear sunlight, may ever and forever 
look upon thy face again ! " 

''Atla," returned the Trapper, "I know not 
what may be. But this I know and swear, 
that if a trail pushed, seeking, through a 
thousand or ten thousand years, may bring 
me to thy side, we two shall meet in heaven." 

" Oh, love, say those sweet words again," 
she cried. " Say more than them. Crowd 
into this one day, that I am sure of, the vows 
and loves of half a life, that I may go, if go 
I must, out of thy sight from Mamelons, 
heartful, upheld by an immortal hope. And 
here I pledge thee, by the Sacred Fire that 



MAMELONS, l8l 

burns forever, that If power bestowed by na- 
ture, or artfully acquired by patience working 
through ten thousand years, may find thee 
after death, then some time will I find my 
heaven in thy arms, not found till then. So, 
now, in holy covenant we will rest until we 
come to Mamelons, and ever after. I feel 
the breeze of wider water on my cheek, and 
breathe the salted air. I shall know soon if 
ever sunrise shine for me at Mamelons." 

So went they down in silence with the tide 
that whirled itself in eddies toward the sea ; 
past L'Anse a I'Eau, w^here now the salmon 
swim and spawn against their will,' past the 

^ At L'Anse a I'Eau, where the Saguenay steamers 
land passengers for Tadousac, the tourist will find a fine 
collection of large salmon at the upper end of the little 
bay or recess, for here is one of the salmon-hatching 
stations under government patronage. 



1 82 MA MELONS. 

sharp point of rounded rocks, where spor- 
tively the white whales ' roll, and, steering 
straight across the harbor's mouth, where her 
Basque fathers anchored ships before the 
years of men,^ ran boat ashore where the 
great ledge runs, sloping down from upper 
sand to water, and shining beach and gray 
rock meet. 

But as they crossed the harbor's mouth, 

^ The white whales, commonly called porpoises, are 
very plentiful at the mouth of the Saguenay, and to a 
stranger present a very novel and entertaining spectacle 
tumbling in the black water. They are hunted by the 
natives for both their skins and oil. 

^ Personally, I hold to the opinion that the eastern 
hemisphere never lost its knowledge of the western, but 
that from immemorial times, the Basques and their Iberian 
ancestors visited at regular intervals the St. Lawrence, 
both gulf and river. Of course, the grounds on which 
T base such an opinion cannot be presented in this note. 



MAMELONS, 1 83 

sailing straight on abreast of Mamelons, its 
bright sands blackened and a shadow dark- 
ened on its front, and, as they bore her ten- 
derly to the terrace, where stood tent and 
priest, a tremor shook the quivering earth, 
and through the darkening air a wave of 
thunder rolled. 

" Dear love," she said, " it may not be. 
The fate still holds. The doom works out 
Its dole. I may not be thy wafe this side 
grave. What rights I have beyond I shall 
know soon. For soon the sight ' will come 

1 It is held by some that certain families have the 
power of "second sight," or to look into the future, 
come to them just before death. I have known cases 
where such power, apparently, did come to the dying. 
The Basque people held strongly to the belief that all of 
their kingly line were seers or prophets, and that, especially 
before dying, each had a full, clear view of the future. 



l84 MAAfELONS, 

to me, and what is hidden now will stand out 
plain." Then, lying on the skins, she gazed at 
Mamelons, looming vast and black in shadow, 
and, closing eyes, she prayed unto the gods, 
the carthborn, old-time fathers of her race. 

But he could not have it so, and when 
prayer w^as ended said : " Atla, we have come 
far for marriage rite, and married we will be. 
Thou art mistaken. I have seen shadow 
settle and heard thunder roll before. In eye 
nor cheek are death's pale signals set. The 
holy man !:; here. Here ring and seal. For- 
<rct the doom, and let the words be read that 
bindeth to the grave." 

To this she answerincr said: ''Dear love, 
thou art in error, but thy word is law. My 
slay is brief. When yonder shadow passes I 
shall pass. There sleeps my father, and with 



MAMELONS. 1 85 

him I must sleep. The earth is conscious. 
I am of those who were, earthborn, and so 
she feels our comine and our crolnof as mother 
feels life and death of child. The sun Is on 
the western hills. At sunset J shall die. But 
If It may stay up thy soul through the sad 
years, bid the good man go on." 

Then took the priest his book, and. In the 
language of the Latins, so old to us, so new 
beside her tongue, whose literature was dead 
a thousand years before Rome was, began to 
bind, by the manufactured custom of modern 
men, whose binding Is of law and not of love, 
and hence a mockery. But ere he came to 
that sweet fragment of love's law and faith, 
stolen from the past, the giving and receiving 
of a ring, symbol of eternity, she suddenly 
lifted hand and said : 



1 86 MA MELONS. 

'' Have done ! Have done ! No need of 
marriage now. No need of rite, nor prayer, 
nor endless ring, nor seal of sacred sign. I 
see what is to be. The veil is lifted and I 
see beyond. I see the millions of my race 
lift over Mamelons. They come as come the 
seas toward shore, rolling in countless billows 
from central ocean. The old Iberian race, 
millions on millions, landscapes of moving 
forms, aligned with the horizon, come, m::rch- 
ing on. Among them, lifted high, the gods. 
On thrones a thousand queens sit regnant, 
raimented like me. Their voice is as the 
sound of many waters : — 

*' ' Last, best, and highest over all, we place 
thee.' 

''The gods say so? So be It, then. Mother, 
I have kept charge. My love has won himx. 



MA MELONS. 1 87 

The old race stops, but by no fault of mine. 
My people, this man is lord and king to me. 
See that ye bring him to my throne when he 
comes seeking to the West. Dear love, you 
will excuse me now. I must pass on ; but 
passing on I leave my soul with thee. Make 
grave for me on Mamelons. Put lily at my 
throat, green boughs on breast, bright sand 
on boughs. Watch with me there one night. 
I will be there with thee. So keep with Atla 
holy tryst one night and only one — then go 
thy way. We two will have sweet meeting 
after many days." And saying this she put 
soft hand in his and died. 

Her lover, kneeling by her couch, put face 
to her cold cheek, nor stirred. The holy man 
said softly holy prayer ; while the old tongue- 
less chief of Mistassinni wrapped head in 



1 88 MA MELONS. 

blanket, and through the Icng night sat as 
one dead 

Next day the silent man made silent grave 
on Mamelons. At sunset they brought her 
to It, ralmented like a queen, and laid her 
body In bright sand ; put lily at her throat, 
green boughs on peaceful breast, and slowly 
sifted clean sand over all. 

That night a lonely man sat by a lonely 
grave, through the long watches keeping holy 
tryst. But when the sun came up, rising out 
of mists which whitened over AntlcostI, he 
rose, and, standing with bared head, he 
said : 

" Atla,' we two will have sweet meet- 

^ I named my lieroine Atla, because I hold that the 
])asques not only are descendants of the old Iberians, 
but that the Iberians were a colony from Atlantis. I 



MAMELONS. 1 89 

Ing after many days." Then went his 
way. 

And there, on that high crest, whose sands 

accept fully Ignatius Donelly's conclusions as to the 
actual old-time existence of a great island continent 
in the Atlantic Ocean, and believe that in it the human 
race began and developed a civilization inconceivably 
perfect and splendid, of which the Egyptian, Peruvian, 
Iberian, and Mexican were only colonial repetitions. 
Atla is, therefore, the proper name for the last of the 
old Basque-Iberian blood to have, as it is the root of 
Atlantis (Atla-ntis), the original motherland of all. I 
have never met Mr. Donelly, and may never meet him, 
and hence I make this opportunity to express the obli- 
gation I am under to him for entertainment and profit. 
The patience of the scholarship that could accumulate 
the material for a book like his " Atlantis " is worthy 
of a wider and more grateful acknowledgment than 
this superficial age of ours is able to give, for it cannot 
ajDpreciate it. No man with any pretensions of schol- 
arly attainments can afford to let " Atlaiitis " go unread. 



I go MAMELONS. 

first saw the sunrise of the world, when sang 
the stars of morning, beyond doom and fate, 
at last, the child of the old race, which 
lived in the beginning, sweetly sleeps at 
Mamelons. 



UNGAVA 

A COMPANION IDYL OF MAMELONS 



To HER who has learned with me and from me the lore of 
woods and waters, the myths of ancient folk and the tra- 
ditions of races now no more ; who wrote the words here 
printed as my thought formed them and whose pleasure 
in the growing sentences made my pleasure in composing 
them ; to whose faith and help I 'owe so much and of 
them may tell so little ; to my adopted daughter, 

Jf* Jlargutrita JHurrag, 

as a tribute and testimony I inscribe Ungava. 

The Author. 

Burlington, Vt., 1890. 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER 



I. — After Mamelons 7 

II. The Coming of Ungava 33 

III. — Ungava's Love 4^ 

IV. — The Wizard of the North 73 

v.— The Conjurer's Account of the Gene- 
sis OF the World 9^ 

VI. The White God of Mistassinni . . . ii6 

VII. — The Council of the Chiefs . . . • i37 

VIII. — Duel of the Old Dumb Chiefs ... 156 

IX. The Fairies' Farewell to Ungava . 



i«i 



UNGAVA. 

A COMPANION IDYL OF MAMELONS. 



CHAPTER I. 

AFTER MAMELONS/ 

T^HUS did the Doom of Mamelons work 
out its dole. And leaving in her grave 
the joy of all his life, the fairest, sweetest 
woman of her race, — whose women were the 
glory of the world, — down from the Mound 
of Fate the Trapper came with heavy step and 

^ Ungava is not in the true sense a sequel of " The 
Doom of Mamelons," for that tale stands complete in 
itself. Nevertheless, the two are closely connected, and 
structurally united in a close companionship, as two 
of the principal characters in Mamelons — the trapper 



8 UNGA VA. 

slow, as one who bears a burden greater than 
his strenorth, to where the tongfueless Chief 
of Mistassinni stood beside his bark, his 
silent paddle in his hand, and to him slowly 
said : 

"Old friend, in yonder sand my love lies 
dead. You helped me lay her lovely body 
down, where it must lie beyond the reach of 
loving hands forever. There, as she bade, 
I have kept holy tryst one night. She met 
me there. To that high crest where first the 
world was born, from silence and from star- 
light she came down and stood beside me. 
I saw her clothed in raiment like a queen, 

and the old chief of Mistassinni — are leading ones 
in this story, and in it are necessarily many allusions 
which are more plain and enjoyable to the reader if he 
has previously read Mamelons. 



UNGA VA. 9 

and all her beauty riper grown stood stately 

in her form, and shone resplendent out of face 

and eye. She told me things to be. And, 

as she talked, I heard the stir of thousands 

round her, and through the starlit air above 

the sands approving murmurs run; but long 

and lonely stretch the years 'twixt this and 

hour of meeting. Empty are my arms of 

that warm life that should be nesding in 

them, and empty all the world. With eyes 

uplifted unto mine, upon my breast her 

mother died. The chief I loved is dead. 

And now she, too, is gone, and with her took 

in going all the sunshine of the world. You, 

now, and I are left alone. Two silent 

ones, for you are tongueless, and I with 

grief am dumb. We two are joined in 

brotherhood of woe. So in this bark of 



lO UNGAVA. 

thine will you and I take seat, and you with 
silent blade shall steer it upward on the 
flooding tide of death-dark water,' colored 
like our grief, between the awful cliffs, 
which, leafless as our lives will be, have 
stood in dead, gray barrenness from the 
foundation of the world. So, now, old friend, 
from this dread shore of Fate push off, and 
we will eo, I know not whither and I care 
not where. We two alone are left, and till 
death parts us will we bide together." 

So was it done. Slowly, without word or 

^ The waters of the Sagnenay are dark and gloomy 
to a degree unknown in any other river or body of 
water I have ever seen, and are noted, the world over, 
because of their peculiar sombre and sinister appearance. 
Looked at from above, they often seem to be as black as 
ink. 



UNGAVA. II 

sign, the old chief Hfted paddle and silendy 
the light boat moved from that dread shore 
which for a thousand years had been the 
shore of fate, and through the whirling eddies, 
whirling strongly up and on the flooding 
waters black as their grief between the 
monstrous walls of rock the silent two went 
floating up into the silence of unknown hap 
and hazard. 

All day they drifted on In silence, until 
they came to where the Marguerite flows 
crystal over shining sands. Then the dumb 
helmsman steered his lio^ht bark inward 
through the current, flowing swift and clear. 
With skilful stroke he pushed It upward 
through the eddying tide until he reached that 
lovely bend where silver birches grow, and 



1 2 UNGA VA. 

where a spring pours down its wimpling line 
of liquid music, singing through the grasses, 
until it, laughing, runs into the smiling river. 
Then, standing on the strand, he to his stricken 
comrade said : ' 

^ The reader must bear in mind that the language of 
pantomime, or sign language, has been brought to a 
wonderful perfection as a means of communicating 
thought among the Indians of this continent. The 
ancient Greeks, as is known to all scholars, found it 
adequate for the purpose of full dramatic expression, 
whether of comedy or tragedy. They did not originate 
it, but borrowed it from older races and ages. The read- 
ing of the motion of the lips is also an ancient accom- 
plishment, if such a word is allowable in connection 
with such an art or practice. Nor is it nearly as difficult 
as one might imagine to follow the pantomimist, and 
catch the sense of even subtle shades of expression. 
Some have thought that it is the earliest, as it certainly 
is the most vivid and picturesque, method of imparting 
human thought. 



UNGAVA. 13 

'' Listen, Trapper, to wisdom born of losses 
many and of many years. At Mamelons your 
love lies dead. Your thoughts are heavy and 
your heart is sore. The wounds of death are 
deep. Time is the only balm that heals its 
hurts, and change. These two salve all and 
heal at last, if ever. The island is no place 
for you or me. There sleeps her mother and 
there sleeps the chief. The house is empty as 
a nest when birds have flown and under snow 
the bough droops down. There will thy grief 
keep fresh and sore. Its ache will grow as 
grows thy sense of loss. Here will we camp 
to-night, and on the morrow northward will 
we go to far Ungava.' Upon its sands and 

^ Ungava is the name of a large bay which runs 
deeply into the body of the continent near the north- 
east corner of the Labrador peninsula. It is remarkable 



14 UNGA VA. 

ice, in distant years, I fought and hunted. 
There, perchance, I may find some, who, 
scarred in those old fights and gray, remember 
me. If not, it is the same. Among the 
Nasquapees is one who knoweth all. He can 
call up the dead.' His eyes see backward 
and before. There is but one thing I would 
know. It may be he can tell it me. Here 
will we sleep to-night. Perchance in sleep 

because of its extraordinary tides, which rise to the 
height of sixty feet and more. Around it, formerly, the 
famous tribe of Nasquapee Indians — if they be Indians 
— had their home. Of these remarkable people I have 
spoken in my note concerning them in Mamelons. 

^ This is an allusion to a famous prophet or high 
priest of the tribe, who, apparently, was the last of a 
long line of prophets, who claimed to have powers such 
as the Witch of Endor possessed and exercised, when, if 
our Old Scriptures are to be credited, she called up the 
spirit of Samuel from the dead. 



UNGAVA. 15 

some dream ' may come. If not forbid, to- 
morrow northward we will go." 

To which the Trapper : 

** Old Chief, your years are many and your 
words are wise. The wounds of death are 
deep, and time and change and God's sure 
help can only heal. The island is an empty 
nest. The fairest and the sweetest bird these 
northern woods may ever know, has flown. 
She has found summer land. She will come 
back no more. The island is the home of 
graves. Some things are there for me to do. 
But they can wait. His kinsmen watch the 

^ As is well known, the Indian is a firm believer in 
dreams as a method of mystic and valuable communica- 
tion. From this old-time superstition no reasoning can 
turn him. He sincerely believes that the Great Spirit 
speaks directly to him in his sleep by their agency. 



1 6 UNGAVA. 

house, and they are true. When out of years 
I have, by many sights and deeds and varying 
haps, carved calmness, and been strengthened, 
I will go back. I will not go till then. I, too, 
have seen Ungava, and have fought upon its 
sands, and stumbled on its blocks of ice, blood- 
wet. I will go north with thee, and hear again 
the roaring of its tides, and hunt the seals be- 
neath the fires that burn the end of the world.' 
It may be that in action swift my soul will find 
its rest, and out of changeful chance forgetful- 
ness will come, and scab the gash of grief now 
bleeding red, and scar it to dull pain. We 



^ The northern Indians will gravely inform you that 
what we call the Aurora Borealis, or Northern Lights, 
are the reflection of flames which ever and anon rush 
out from the end of the world, which they hold to be 
forever in a state of combustion. 



UNGA VA. i 7 

will go north, and bide together till we die." 
So was it done. 

So went they northward, and for half a year 
did widely roam. Strange fortunes fell to 
them. They passed the sources of the streams 
that flow toward the south. They saw the 
forests dwindle down until the mighty pine was 
but a shrub. They visited old fields, where, 
in forgotten years old fights had been, whose 
only record was scattered and white bones. 
They made them bags of eider,' and housed 
themselves in snow. They trapped them furs 
which gave them garments such as princes 
wear. They fed on meat of fish and fowl and 
animal, juicy and fat, cooked with a hunter's 
art. For bread they digged them roots, which, 

^ The Nasquapee Indians sleep in bags lined with 
eider-down. 



1 8 UNGAVA. 

deftly parched and pounded, yielded substance 
sweeter than the wheaten loaf. So roamed 
they through the north, through those wild 
wastes where trails are scarce as honor among 
men. One, seeking day and chance, if 
they still waited; the other, balm for wounds 
within, and that forgetfulness which dulls the 
edge of pain and makes it easier to be borne. 
So leisurely they drew their trail into the 
north as men who seek at random, or seek 
forgetfulness of selves : — that sweet oblivion 
or dim memory of woes. 

So roamed they on. One night they camped 
beneath a hill, one of a range that stretched 
a hundred miles from east to west : a ridge 
of mighty bowlders, meteoric stones and rocks 
volcanic, treeless, soilless, a monstrous jumble 
of chaotic debris that might be monument 



UNGAVA. 19 

above a ruined world.' There In wild laby- 
rinth of desolation they made their bivouac. 
Before they slept, the old chief, standing in 
the camp-light, signed: 

"Trapper, some evil fate Is coming swift 
as death. Twice on the trail to-day I felt 
the ledofes shake.'' I hear the sound of run- 
ning noises under ground. The fire to-night 



* Nothing can be imagined more desolate and dismal 
than this section of the Labrador peninsula. If Ignatius 
Donnelly's theory is correct, that a comet once struck 
the earth near what is now the northern extremity of 
the globe, one might easily imagine that, west and north 
of Ungava, he was standing amid the ruins caused by 
the awful catastrophe. 

^ Earthquake shocks are not infrequent throughout 
this section. Some years the seismic disturbances are 
felt for months together, and scarcely a year passes that 
one or more shocks are not experienced. 



20 UNGAVA. 

burned blue, and talked. I smell a storm. ^ 
This is a wilderness of rocks. There is no 
trail. If sun should fail what eye might 
thread a passage through ? I fear some fate 
is coming. What counsel do you give?" 
To which the Trapper made reply : 
" Chief, lie down and sleep. The stars are 
bright. The sky is blue. No storm is com- 
ing. If it comes, we will bide in our bags. 
Two days at most will blow it out. Our food 
will last till sun comes forth. The rocks are 

^ Even many white hunters I have met in my wander- 
ings have boldly claimed that the coming of great 
atmospheric disturbances was plainly interpreted by 
the nose. May it not be possible that the organs of 
smell, like those of sight, are much more acute in those 
who are " lone hermits of untainted woods " than in 
us who live from day of birth in smoky and fou] 
atmospheres ? 



UNGAVA. 21 

jumbled, and all look alike. Who cares ? We 
are not boys. Can you and I lose trail ? 
That were a joke. Your nose is not a 
hound's. No storm is coming. Lie down 
and sleep. Let ledges shake. Unless they 
shake me out of bag, I will sleep on." So 
spake he lighdy, and, muttering in his throat, 
the old chief crept into his eider nest, and, 
like a duck within its warmth of feathers 
the two men slept. 

That niorht the dreaded storm came down 
and such a storm no man had ever seen in 
all the North. Nine days it blew. Nine 
niehts its roar was on the hills of rocks 
piled high as broken trees. Nine sunless 
mornings came. The falling fleece turned 
darkest night to gray. From out the north 
chaotic whirlwinds rushed, whirling in scream- 



2 2 UNGAVA. 

Ing eddies onward. The upper stillness, which, 
woven by the gods in silent looms, is folded 
like a downy mantle round the world as vest- 
ment cast by slumber over weary beds, was 
torn in shrieking shreds and blown down the 
gale in strips of noise. The forest, like a man 
entombed alive, moaned, writhed, and roared, 
unseen. Hills into distance ran from sight. 
The streams stopped running and the lakes 
lay shivering, dumb and black, beneath the 
ice that was Itself invisible. The world turned 
gray, and through the whirling, eddying fleece 
the lenses of the eye reflected only falling 
flakes. Chaos had come again and all the 
earth was without form and void. 

Amid the storm whose fury blotted out the 
world, the two men, blinded, faint from hun- 
ger, wandered on. Each day they groped for 



UNGAVA. 23 

shelter ; each night, burrowed under snow, 
awaiting death. All skill was vain ; all cour- 
age useless. They felt that they were doomed. 
Twice had the chief refused to move. Twice 
had he fixed his eyes on vacancy. And twice 
the death-song struggled in his tongueless 
throat. The Trapper would not yield. His 
heart was true as tested steel to bravest hand. 
It would not break nor bow to shock, how- 
ever heavy. Twice had he rallied his old 
friend from trance for further effort, when, 
staggering onward round the sharp edge of 
a ledge, they slipped together and both fell 
through covering snow into a fissure yawn- 
ing wide, and downward half a hundred feet 
they slid into a mighty cavern ! 

So, into shelter under ground, through God's 
mercy, had they dropped, when, blinded by the 



24 UNGA VA. 

Storm, and hunger-faint, they stumbled from 
the cHff and fell. The cliff, a rounded bowlder 
nicely poised, had lost its balance as they fell, 
and, rolling after, lay on the shute through 
which they slid, huge and heavy as a hill. 

Then spake the Trapper, as he staggered to 
his feet, grimly jesting in the face of death : 

*' Here are we safely housed, old friend, at 
last ! Never did mongrel cur, chased by she- 
wolf, skurry into kennel faster. I fell with 
legs so wide apart that all the hillside fol- 
lowed. Its cobbles pelted on my back as I 
slid downward. I'll strike a light and see if 
we have host to welcome lodgers." 

Then he struck light and to the wick of a 
short candle placed it ; and as it kindled into 
blaze he held it high above his head and in 
the light it gave the two men sought with 



UNGAVA. 25 

earnest eyes the nature of the place, and 
whether it were home or grave. 

It was an old-time cave. Home had it 
been and grave, for those whose deeds and 
death are prehistoric. In ages lost to memory 
of men, man had been there before. Fleeing 
from sudden heat that blasted, or dreadful cold 
succeeding heat, or from that awful monster ' 

^ Many tribes of Red Men have among them the 
legend of a great catastrophe caused by a comet strik- 
ing the earth. The story or myth of a "flying dragon, 
breathing fire and smoke," is found in all old literatures, 
and always connected with a vast ruin wrought on the 
earth. There is no reason, in the nature of things, why 
a collision should not occur between the earth and one 
of the many "monstrous and lawless wanderers of the 
skies." Nor is it inconceivable that such a collision in 
the remote past did occur. Assuming this to be true, 
many remarkable and now mysterious phenomena on the 
earth's surface could be easily explained. Kepler de- 



26 UNGAVA. 

bursting out of distance into northern sky, 
nigh where the steadfast star now sentinels 
the heavens, and breathing fires in volume 
wider than the world, rushed, tearing down- 
ward toward the pole, struck the even earth 
head on and knocked it from its level poise, 
changing its course forever, so bi!"ying all in 

clared that " comets are scattered through the heavens 
with as much profusion as fishes in the ocean." Lalande 
had a list of seven hundred comets observed in his time. 
Arago estimated that the comets belonging to the solar 
system, within the orbit of Neptune, number seventeen 
and a half inillions. While Lambert says Jive hundred 
7?iilaojis are a very moderate estimate. And this, be it 
remembered, does not include those that are constantly 
pouring in from the infinite spaces beyond the limits of 
the solar system. When the multitude of the comets is 
considered, the wonder is, not that 07ie has struck the 
earth, but rather that, if I may so speak, the earth has 
managed to dodge them at all ! 



UNGAVA. 27 

ruin : — hither to this deep cavern had he with 
his children wildly run, and, screaming, plunged 
Into It, as men to-day running out of fire with 
garments blazing plunge headlong Into saving 
wells. 

There had he lived, there fed his hunger, 
worshipped God, wrought with ^his hands — 
and died. For, scattered here and there, were 
instruments of stone : a hatchet, flint heads for 
spears, and arrows sharpened with laborious 
pains. Brands, too, were there, which once 
had glowed with fire for human need, — charred 
proofs of tribes and primal things, which any 
careless foot may spurn as worthless, and yet 
be older than the Pyramids. Amid the dust 
the foot disturbed were teeth of men and 
animals that lived in the forgotten ao-es. 
Searching through an inner passage, seeking 



28 UNGAVA. 

outlet, the Trapper found a knife of bronze 
lying on the floor, its handle resting in the 
dusty outline of a human hand, and wondered 
if the breast that felt it last had been of priest 
or victim. Who might say ? Who, who might 
ever tell the secrets of that dread place and 
symbol ? Here, penned with death, for many 
days they groped and sat in gloom. At last 
the Trapper, feeling that death was nigh, said 
suddenly, '' Old friend, our time to say farewell 
has come." Then, for the last time lighted he 
the feeble wick, and, as it warmed, the small 
flame slowly grew until it globed with yellow 
light the central gloom. Then rose the chief 
of Mistassinni, cast robe of fur aside, and, 
grim, gray and withered, stood forth to sight, 
and to the Trapper signed : 

** Trapper, we die a death of shame. We 



UNGAVA. 29 

are not men. We are as hedgehogs in a 
hole, shut in by ice. Here shall we die and 
rot, and be no more forever, — never see lig^ht 
of day, nor breathe the upper air. I am a 
chief. Before the Esquimau tore out my 
tongue and ate it, my voice was heard in 
every battle fought through all the North, and 
where it sounded men knew Death was there, 
and shrank. Only the Chief' and you had 
fame so great. In feasts and dance, and when 
the stake ^ was struck, our names were linked 
together like three equal stars, and mothers 
of the Esquimaux hushed crying child with 
whispered mention of our awful fame. But 

^ Referring to the chief who was uncle to Atla. [See 
Mamelons.] 

^ The stake around which the war dance is danced, 
and into which each warrior strikes his hatchet, thus 
signifying his enlistment for the war. 



30 



UNGA VA. 



dying here like starving hog in hole, I never 
more may see the lodges of my tribe ' nor 
sit in council with the chiefs among whom I 
am greatest. The battle will be set, and he 
I hate will live. And younger men will 
never know my fame. Do for me one more 
deed, far better than that one you did for 
me upon the ridge above the Saguenay when 
you did save me from the Esquimaux, and 
prove your love again. Draw now thy knife, 
and place its point betwixt the ribs that are 
above my heart, that I may lean upon it and 
die as warrior dies in battle under foeman's 
knife, and not be smothered like a hog in 
hole." 

^ An Indian believes that if he is smothered under- 
ground, his spirit will remain buried with his body, and 
never reach the Spirit-land, viz., that he will miss the 
blessing of immortality. 



UNGA VA. 31 

And from his shrunken shoulders, haughtily, 
his blanket did he cast, and posed himself 
above the burning wick whose dying flame 
began to waver, that friendship might do for 
him the deed he prayed for. 

Then said the Trapper, speaking through 
the failing flashes of the light : 

'' Never before, old Chief, did friend in 
dying ask deed of me I did not do. But 
this I may not. I may not redden knife of 
mine with thy old blood. I am a man without 
a cross,' and such a deed I am forbid. It is 
not fit. Your superstition is not true. Out 
of this cavern filled with old-time bones, we 
two will go at death into free air : thou to 
the lodges of thy tribe ; I to her throne." 

* A pure-blooded white. 

''' Referring to his joining at death his beloved Atla, 



32 UA'GAVA. 

Hunger has done its work, and we are weak. 
We will lie down and sleep as after battle, 
battle-tired. Sleeping, we soon shall pass 
to deeper sleep, and so to happy waking. 
Old friend, the light is going. Brief is our 
parting. Look. With this failing flash I give 
thee dying cheer, and bid thee long farewell." 
And with the word the light went out, and 
in the gloom of that old grave of prehistoric 
man the two men stood, lost to each other's 
sieht forever. 

who, in dying [see Mamelons], beheld herself elected 
by the gods to sit on the " last and highest throne of her 
old race." 



CHAPTER II. 

THE COMING OF UNGAVA. 

SO Stood the two in darkness and in 
silence, waiting death. The one with 
Indian patience grim and dumb ; the other, 
brave, high-hearted, revolving many thoughts. 
When, suddenly, the pulseless air moved with 
vibrations. The awful silence grew sweedy 
vocal, and a voice, clear-toned as silver bell or 
flute, said, from afar : 

" Who speaks of dying and of shameful 
death? Whose voice bids friend the long 
farewell, and gives him dying cheer? No 
death is here, nor dying. Ungava comes ! " 
And in the distant gloom, far down the cav- 

33 



34 UNGA VA. 

erned corridor, shone out a star, pure white, 
intense, ilhiminatlng all, and in its dazzling 
radiance, clothed in white fur from head to 
foot, a wand within her hand uplifted high 
whose point burned unconsumed, with face 
of snow, and eyes and hair of night's jet hue, 
floating on as vision seen in dream, there 
came — a girl ! 

So in the white licrht stood the three, and 
on the one the two did gaze with eyes that 
grew with wonder. No greater change might 
there have been had angel of the Lord 
descended to that cave to summon dust and 
bone of dead humanity to glorious resurrec- 
tion. Then, rallying from first shock of vast 
surprise, the Trapper awe-struck said : 

'' Shadow or substance. Spirit or flesh. I 
know not which, strange vision, but by the 



UNGAVA. 35 

living God I know that never unto man in 
deeper need did he send saving angel. Who 
art thou, thou who bearest name of wildest 
shore on the round earth, and of what world ? 
Speak message out, and tell thy tale ; for 
whether I be quick or dead, I know not as 
I look on thee." 

Then, clear as bell or flute in evening air 
of summer, came the words, filling all the 
cave with sweetness like a song sung by- 
unseen singer : 

'' John Norton, thou art known to me, for 
I have seen thee when a thousand miles 
divided. Amid the smoke of battle have I 
seen thee move when death went with thee, 
step for step. Asleep, at night, beneath the 
pines or at the base of rocks in strange wild 
places in the woods, above thee, sleeping, have 



36 UNGAVA. 

I Stood and warded evil from thee. Wild 
beasts and wilder men with nose of hunger 
and with eyes of hate, have I turned or fright- 
ened from thy couch, and in the morning thou 
didst wake refreshed and safe, as one who 
knows not he is guarded. I am a spirit. 
This mortal frame I use, but am not of it. I 
am thy angel. Before his face that is forever 
veiled, I stand forever pleading. For every 
soul born into flesh has guardian spirit. Thine 
am I, and I have come in hour of need to 
save. Great service do I thee. Great service 
must thou do in turn for me. Here hast 
thou wandered into realms where, mid the 
ruins of a world collapsed, the arts and 
mysteries of that ruined world live on.' My 

^ The prophet of the Nasquapee tribe or race — I 
incline to the view that they are originally of a different 



UNGAVA. 37 

soul Is thine. Thy soul is mine. We two 
are knit forever. So much I tell thee now. 
The rest shall be revealed as time moves on. 
My grandsire, after flesh, is Prophet of the 
North. He, child of the White God. This 
old chief knows my line, and therefore me. 
At Mistassinni did that line begin. At Mis- 
tassinni will it end. For he and I must sleep 
where his and my ancestors sleep, in that old 

racial stock than the red Indian — held that the world 
had been wrecked by a vast and far-reaching catastrophe, 
and his race — all save a small remnant — destroyed by 
it. He also held that that old race, thus destroyed, was 
the custodian of arts and powers, mysterious and potent 
on dead and living alike, and that these had been 
originally taught them by " the gods ; " viz., superior 
beings, who had come from some other sphere, bringing 
with them knowledge and powers "too high for mortal 
minds." And that this fearful knowledge had been con- 
tinued in his line, or caste, and was known to him. 



38 UNGAVA. 

cave where sound in constant council voices 
of the dead and spirit murmurings." ' 

Then to the chief she said : 

'* Old Chief, above thy head a hundred years 

^ There is at Mistassinni a celebrated cave, which is 
regarded by the Indians with the utmost reverence, awe, 
and fear. Not one of them will ever look at it to this day 
in passing. The reason of this profound feeling seems 
to be found in their superstitious conviction that, from 
remote time, their dead chiefs were buried in it, as were 
also their prophets or sorcerers. It seems to have been 
the sepulchre of ancient days and people, for it has not 
been so used for a long time. They believe that the 
spirits of the dead hold their councils there, and that 
ghostly debate is constantly going on within its great 
chamber. I cannot ascertain that any one has ever 
actually visited this celebrated cavern, or has any accu- 
rate knowledge of its size or appearance. All that is 
known of it is that it was once the place of sepulchre, 
and is regarded with utmost fear and veneration by all 
the tribes of the North. 



UNGAVA. 39 

have rolled. Look with the eyes of many 
days. Behold, the first and last am I. Thou 
knowest fate, and its old voice. For, when 
the first White God did'st come from out of 
sea in boat not built by man, and, on the 
beach all wet and foul with brine and sand, 
was found by thy old sire, who then was boy, 
the prophet of your tribe did say, ' When girl 
is born instead of boy, the White Gods 
die.' Last chief of Mistassinni, here amid 
the ancient dead, the daughter of the 
White Ones, doomed like thee to end the 
line of glory, brings life and gives thee 
greeting." 

Then did the grim old Chief do mystic deed. 
There, standing naked to his waist, the Totem 
of his tribe in red upon his breast, he lifted 
hands of plainest pantomime. Thrice did he 



40 UNGA VA. 

wheel the sun around the earth in stately 
motion. Then strung his bow, and from his 
quiver four arrows drew, and, breaking pointed 
heads, he shot the harmless bolts to south and 
north, to east and west. So saying, ''Thy 
reign is one of peace, and over all the earth." 
Then from his head the horned band he took 
— that symbol of old sovereignty, older than 
earliest throne,' — and from his wrinkled neck 

^ Horns, as symbolic of power and sovereignty, are, 
literally, older than thrones. Like the Cross — the old- 
time symbol of joy and plenty — they run backward in 
time beyond all interrogation. When or how the sym- 
bolic significance first arose, no one may ascertain. If 
there was no other evidence, the horns of the bison on 
the head-band of an Indian chief — for none save chiefs 
of the highest rank can wear them — would prove that 
the red men of this continent belong to the primeval 
races. As the Trapper would say, " That is a sign that 
cannot lie ! " 



UNGAVA. 41 

the string of savage claws/ won In chanceful 
battle with the polar bear whose lightest blow 
Is death, — a necklace whose every pearl had 
come at risk of life, — and laid them at her 
feet. Then on his withered breast he signed 
the sacred sign, and In solemn pantomime took 

^ The string of bear's claws round the neck of a chief 
is the highest possible proof of his skill, courage, and 
rank, since every claw in the necklace must have been 
taken from a bear that he with his own hand — unas- 
sisted by any — had killed. When it is remembered that 
the Indian had no weapon save his arrows, his hatchet, 
and his spear, some idea of the strength and courage 
required to secure such savage trophies can be formed. 
It takes a man of supremest nerve and courage to face 
a grizzly or polar bear with a Winchester to-day. What, 
then, must be thought of the stout-heartedness of one 
who, alone, and armed only with such feeble weapons 
as the native Indian had, would bravely attack these 
monstrous animals? Verily, no braver race of men 
ever lived than the red Indian of this continent. 



42 UNGA VA. 

goblet filled with water and poured ' It on the 
ground. Then stately stood, and signed : 

" Child of the Gods that were as snow ! 
Daughter of Power and Mystery ! Queen of 
Splrlt-Land, whose coming In the flesh before 
I died, and going with me to the grave, was 
told a hundred years ago when I was born ! 
Ungava ! I, Chief of ancient times, about to 
die, salute thee ! For, the same Voice that 
spoke thy fate, above me, sleeping In my 
father's tent, did say, ' This boy, a chief to 
be — the last and greatest of his line — shall 
die In battle with his foe upon the sands of 

^ The Indians of the Labrador peninsula present to 
the student of their habits and customs the curious 
spectacle of being both Christian and pagan, and in 
an equal measure. They will receive absolution at the 
hands of the priest, and the next instant engage with 
equal sincerity in an act of superstitious worship. 



UNGA VA. 43 

wild Ungava, when from the White Gods shall 
be born a girl that bears Its name.' So art 
thou known to me, and so I know my foe 
still lives, and day and chance will come. 
Trapper, 'tis well thy knife stayed In Its sheath, 
for now I know I shall not die like hoo- In 

o 

hole, but like a warrior on the bloody field, 
with sound of battle In my ears, my foe beside 
me, and the dead In heaps around. So, like a 
chief shall I take trail that leads me Into Spirit- 
land." 

Then, after pause, the Trapper spake : 
'' Ungava, such boastful words are vain, 
and vain this pantomime of worship. The 
light of heaven never will he see, nor foe, 
nor battle red. Here are we penned with 
death. Through veins that never shrank be- 
fore, a chill creeps on, and all my frame Is 



44 UNGA VA. 

weakened of my power. If thou art able, 
lead me from this dreadful place filled with 
the smell of graves and dust of mouldered men, 
to where my eyes can see the sun once more 
and to my nostrils come the wind that blow- 
eth strong and pure ; and, whether thou be 
witch or woman, soul or flesh, a living sweet- 
ness or the mate of death, to me thou shalt 
be angel evermore." 

So spake the Trapper with clear tones. To 
him Ungava listened as wanderer listens to 
sweet song sung by familiar voice through 
dewy air to him home-coming : — a song that 
tells of love and home and peaceful days that 
have been his, and shall be his again forever. 
Then to him said : 

'' Fear not. Thou shalt see sun again. 
Upon thy face shall blow the wind that blow- 



UNGA VA, 45 

eth strong and pure. I am the queen of 
under and of upper world. The earth is hol- 
low, and its outer shell is cracked with pas- 
sages like the ice. I know them all. They 
are blazed trails to me. At touch of mine 
they flame with light far brighter than the sun. 
I know the under ways, — a labyrinth of pas- 
sages which are to others endless as those 
tangled circles where the wicked dead go 
wandering, vainly seeking end of doom and 
the warm light of upper world, whose loves 
and light they forfeited by evil deeds. Through 
these I will guide safely on to where my grand- 
sire sits whose eyes have seen the coming and 
the going of three times fifty years ; who knows 
the arts and mysteries of lost worlds and ages, 
and has power on dead and living. Nor fear 
the chill that bringeth death, nor that dread 



46 UNGAVA. 

weakening which has shrivelled up the full- 
veined strength that in thy frame was born, 
that I have seen go forth in battle mightily, 
until I veiled my eyes in horror at the red- 
ness of thy path amid the bodies, even as my 
soul, admiring, leaped, glorying in thy power. 
Here in this vial, cut from crystal under pole, 
where, vibrant, quick w^ith living sparks, glows 
that electric force which is of Him nor man 
nor spirit ever saw, who rules the universe he 
made, and is forever making by laws that work 
forever, — the great I AM, — is vital liquid, 
which, were you dying and one drop was laid 
upon your tongue, you would rise up strong 
as a giant. Thus with my finger, moistened 
with this living essence, I wet thy bloodless 
lips. And thine, old withered Chief ; and bid 
ye follow me. Twice twenty leagues we go 



UNGAVA. 47 

through warm and cold, this way and that, 
through crust of earth cracked into fissures 
when the fire-breathing Dragon ' of the 
North, whose tail was wider than the world, 
struck it head on, until we come to where my 
grandsire waits to show us, ere he dies, things 
that were and things that are to be. Come 
on ! Come on ! I am thy angel. Trapper ! 
Follow thou the light that burns because I 
will it ! Follow me, and fear not ! I am 
Ungava ! " 

1 The breadth of the tail of the great comet of 1811, 
at its widest part, was nearly fourteen millions of miles ; 
the length of it, one hiDidred and sixteen 7?iillions of miles. 
The earth, remember, is only seven thousand nine hun- 
dred and forty-five miles wide. If the tail of such a 
comet as that of 18 11 should sweep over our globe, it 
would not be large enough to make a bullet-hole in it ! 



CHAPTER III. 



ungava's love. 



'' T T ERE are we come at last. Here, safely 
guided, I have brought you through the 
under ways of earth : — the cracks and fissures 
in her solid crust, made in the aires of forgot- 
ten time, when out of distances beyond her 
orbit fell the bolt of ruin ' that did rive apart 
the underlying granite. Past lakes of boil- 

^ It is a remarkable fact, and extremely suggestive, 
that a belief existed among the Indian tribes of the 
American continent that the earth was once struck by 
a vast physical body coming suddenly and at tremen- 
dous speed out of space, which caused an enormous 
ruin. We find this legend or old-time faith among the 
Aztecs, the Pueblo Indians, the Mandans, the Dacotahs 

or Siouxs, the Chicasaws or Creeks, and all the many 

48 



UNGA VA, 49 

ing water, hot with central ^ heat ; on banks 
of rivers sulphur-edged and bottomed; past 
springs whose flames burn blue and white, 
yielding no smoke, and dreadful pits which 
vent the smothered fires where righteous igno- 
rance believes are penned the damned ; I, you 

branches of the Algonquin family. With more or less 
difference in descriptive details, as would naturally be 
expected, the great fact is the same in each tribe or 
race. With this legend are blended other ones of cave 
life, and the loss and renewal of the seasons, of day 
and night, and of vast climatic changes which came 
to portions of the earth inhabited by their ancestors, 
as the result of this monstrous visitation. Back of all 
these legends in time, there must have been some fact 
as the originating cause. At least, so it would seem. 

1 It is well known that in many of the deep, subterra- 
nean passages of the earth, especially in sections of the 
earth's surface subject to earthquake forces, the waters 
are hot, and some of the springs are, literally, of boiling 
water. 



50 UNGA VA, 

have guided and brought safely on to sure re- 
treat. Here, crystal, flow sweet waters. Here 
bread and meat await your hunger. On these 
piled skins and under eider blankets lighter 
than moonlit air, you can find blessed sleep. 
Eat, drink, and sleep. Fear not. Trapper, 
this light is of the day. The air you breathe 
has poured in currents past the stars. When 
food and sleep have made you strong again, 
Ungava will return, and taking hand in hers, 
will lead you up where you shall see the orb 
that lights the world, and hear beneath the 
cliffs the tides come roaring in. Old Chief, 
sleep well and long. You shall find foe and 
chance, and out of glorious battle go like war- 
rior to your sires. Eat, drink, and rest, while 
from my chamber nigh I sing the song that 
bringeth sleep and pleasant dreams." 



UNGAVA. 51 

ungava's song. 
I. 

When men do sleep, their angels keep 

Love's watch where'er they be. 
They plant or till, they sow or reap 

On mountain, plain, or sea. 
They lose or win, they laugh or weep. 

Who knows which it may be ? 
Sleep, Trapper, sleep. Dream, Trapper, dream. 

There comes no harm to thee. 

II. 
Fair, fair is she, whose deep dark eyes 

Gaze fondly down on thee. 
Warm, warm her heart. Beyond the skies 

She longing waits for thee. 
Her bosom white, her eyes of night, 

Are waiting there for thee. 
Sleep, Trapper, sleep. Dream, Trapper, dream, 

Of Heaven, and her, and — me ! 



52 UJVGAVA. 

III. 

Mine, mine to keep. Hers, hers to have. 

So are we blessed three. 
Soul of my soul. Heart of her heart. 

I keep. She has. Ah, me ! 
The lots are drawn. The wheel stands still. 

I keep. She has. Ah, me ! 
Sleep, Trapper, sleep. Dream, Trapper, dream, 

Of Heaven, and her, and — me ! 

IV. 

Before our birth our fates are fixed. 

How may they altered be } 
Why murmur, then } Why hope or wish.? 

Who can the end foresee } 
If I lose life, I yet may find 

The life I lose for thee. 
Sleep, Trapper, sleep. Dream, Trapper, dream, 

Of Heaven, and her, and — me ! 



UNGAVA. 53 

V. 

Sweet, sweet to one is duty done 

When heart is ruled by will. 
Sweet, sweet to know, as days go on, 

That you preserve from ill. 
I may not have, but I can keep. 

So let the wheel stand still. 
Sleep, Trapper, sleep. Dream, Trapper, dream. 

Of Heaven, and her, and — me ! 

So slept they through long hours. Then, 
by the longing of her heart impelled, Ungava 
came to where the Trapper slept, eager to 
look upon his face again. So softly to his 
chamber did she steal, and standing over him 
still slumberinof on, she said : 

" He sleeps ! O sleep, rest lightly on him 
as the fur upon the sleeping ermine, when 
under its warm whiteness his little life reposes 



54 UiVGAVA. 

undisturbed. Be to his wearied frame as the 
cool water to the runner's feet, when, hot and 
swollen, they have brought him safely to the 
end of perilous trail, foe-chased. Be to his 
soul as Is that volatile oblivion with which 
the gods ease pain, to wounded warrior, that 
he may feel no more the wounds of grief, the 
pain of bruises got In fearful falls, or have 
his dreams disturbed by roar of dubious battle. 
O sleep ! sweet jailer of the soul, lock up his 
senses tight within his mighty breast ; stop 
ear so closely that no vagrant sound may steal 
Into Its vaulted vestibule and beat its vibrant 
drum. Seal down his heavy lids that no swift 
flash of light electric shall, with pointed lances, 
pry their edges open ; that I may gaze upon 
him undisturbed and question his unconscious 
soul, that, as the ancient oracles with lips of 



UNGAVA, 55 

Stone, not knowing what they said nor sens- 
ing joy or doom, so it may speak of fate and 
tell me if I live or die. Thrice round him will 
I walk that he in sacred circles three may be 
enfolded. Thrice over him, recumbent, the 
dust of dim forgetfulness I sift, that, through 
its drifts oblivious, he may not wish to rise. 
So sleeps he deep and well. Ah, me ! if to 
my senses there could come such blest ob- 
livion ! " 

Long stood she then and gazed upon him 
as he lay asleep. Then walked away, hands 
clasped in doubt ; returned, and, standing over 
him, exclaimed : 

** Oh, heart within, be still ! Rebellious 
bosom, cease, cease, to lift and sink tumul- 
tuous ! Be as the level sea when ebb is 
ended and the flood is stayed. And ye, pale 



56 t/NGAVA. 

sisters, gentle spirits of the skies, in whose 
sweet loving is no trace of mortal passion, 
help me who am earth-born, but doomed to 
be unto this man, or god, — I 'know not which, 
— a guard and guide forever ; to chill this mor- 
tal warmth within me into ice, lest love shall 
bring me woe and anguish evermore. Ah, 
me ! Ah, me ! That I, a woman, should be 
doomed to look upon a man, like this ! To 
see his soul pure as a child's ; the gentleness 
of his spirit when unvexed ; the might of hand 
which, single and alone, shapes battle ; the 
modesty of nature too humble to know its 
greatness ; and that old sense of truth which 
sweareth to its hurt and changeth not, keep- 
ing word and bond to lowliest given unto edge 
of death, — and be forbid to love him ! Did 
ever woman on the earth before have fate like 



UNGAVA. 57 

this fall on her ! Oh, thou who did'st weave 
fate for me, appear, appear, and tell the child 
of ancient days, if I do right or wrong to 
question destiny ! " 

Then, in reply, from out the gloom of farther 
distance came a voice, saying: 

'' Ungava, light of face but dark of soul,^ fear 
not to question and to know. The Powers that 
work for thee are mighty. The threads that 
wove thy fate were mixed and tangled dubi- 
ously. Love cuts all knots, and love, per- 
chance, may out of fate deliver. Child of the 
Past, the old gods love you, and behold. 
Call up his soul and question freely. It shall 
speak truth oracular, and to his breast return 
not knowing." 

Then, rallying courage for the deed, Ungava 

said : 

^ Referring to her foreboding of coming doom 



58 UNGAVA. 

*' So be it, then. I will call up his soul and 
know the truth. God ! If from his soul, un- 
conscious, I should learn that from his eyes 
one look of love would ever come to mine 
before I die ! Such look would last me 
through eternity and make my heaven a mem- 
ory ! " Then, proudly posed, with hand ex- 
tended, grasping wand of power, she sang : 

" From out his breast where thou art hid, 
Oh, soul, come forth when thou art bid. 
Prepare to leave thy home of sense, 
And love shall be thy recompense. 
For one brief moment rise and tell 
The fate that makes my heaven or hell. 
I fain would know what will befall. 
So come, and answer love's sweet call. 

Now, by the mother that did bear. 
By powers of earth and powers of air, 



UNGAVA. 59 

By that sweet thing you most do love, 
On earth below or heaven above. 
By babe in cradle, corpse in grave, 
And by this wand I now do wave 
Above his sleeping breast, arise, 
And here take form before my eyes." 

Then was such sight as mortal never saw. 
Around the Trapper, as he slumbered on, a 
smoke as that of incense did arise, in color 
rosy-red, until it hid his sleeping form from 
sight of gazer ; and out of its enfolding came 
a voice, which said : 

''I heard a voice I may not disobey call me 
from out this sleeping body that I animate 
and which to me is as strone hand to the 
directing will. Why am I called before my 
time ? Ungava, what would'st thou know of 
me, or him? " 



6o UNGA VA. 

Then said Ungava : 

'* If ever I may have thee as mine own." 

To which the Voice repHed : 

" Yea, I am thine already. We two belong 
to him." 

Ungava : 

'' But I am woman. And a woman's wants 
are mine. Unless he loves, I must bear doom 
and dole. Oh, tell me, will he love me ? " 

To this the Voice : 

'' When in the cave which, but for thee, had 
been his grave, he swore — 'If thou would'st 
lead him forth where he might see the sun 
and breathe the air of heaven, thou should'st 
be Angel to him evermore.' " 

Ungava : 

" I know. I know his angel will I be. But 
will he love me ? " 



UNGAVA. 6 1 

Again the Voice : 

*' The woman that he loves must be a 
queen." 

Ungava : 

*' Queen ! Queen am I. My throne is an- 
cient as the Stars of Morning. Earth and 
air, past world and future, rule I. Speak 
once again. Shall I be Queen to him ? " 

To this the Voice made slow and solemn 
answer : 

''If thou would'st have him break his faith 
and be to w^ord and bond untrue, living or 
dead, then may'st thou be his Queen." 

Then slowly thin and thinner grew the 
smoke until it vanished, and in the cham- 
ber dim and dark Ungava stood above the 
Trapper, slumbering on. 

"Break faith!" she slowly said. "To word 



62 UNGAVA. 

and bond, be, llvinor or dead, untrue ! Oh, 
soul, thou did'st mistake if thou did'st think a 
woman's love would tempt the man she loved 
to such a deed. This man is honest. Such 
other one there may not be to-day on earth. 
Within his breast honor is as the breath is to 
his nostrils. Who, by the gift of all her heart, 
has paid the price and owns him, I know 
not. What woman of these later days when 
women have lost ancient beauty and are 
dwarfed from loyalty's high port to fickle- 
ness, might with her little self pay queenly 
price, is past all credence. Nay, it must be 
false. Such woman lives not. The time has 
been when women in their beauty wedded 
gods, and immortality paid the price of death 
to win them, and winning them, died happy 
in their arms. But that is past. From some 



UNGA VA. 63 

old grave of porphyry or pearl, where she in 
sweet embalmment slept, had he the power to 
summon up the beauteous dead of olden 
time, some Queen, crowned and raimented 
in royalty, with all the fire and passion of 
her sex's perfection in her blood, might have 
arisen at his call, and, seeing him in battle or 
on the edge of death stand fearless, flung 
herself into his arms and claimed him for her- 
self and for her throne. But now ! It cannot 
be. There is no woman living fit for him. 
My power shall seek and find her. He has 
been cheated. My eyes shall see. If she be 
fit for him — alas ! alas ! I yield him to her 
arms, and yielding him I will lie down and 
die, and in the grave find — perhaps — forget- 
fulness ! But if she be not fit ; if she stand 
dwarfed beside him ; if he were cheated by 



64 UNGA VA. 

some accident of fate that came Avith tardy 
foot or ran too swift ; if she be not as crown 
to kingly head ; then will I win him to my- 
self, and so be perfect angel in being perfect 
woman. But hush! He moves! Ah, what 
a sigh was that ! I thought I was the only 
one that sighed. I will away, and come again 
when he awake." 

Then vanished she. As light retreats into 
the west at day's decline so glided she into 
the farther openings of the cave, still gazing 
backward as she faded into darker distance. 
The Trapper woke. His eyes moved in their 
sockets, seekingly, as one who, sleeping, has 
lost sense of place and time and circumstance ; 
then memory came, and sitting half recumbent 
murmured he : 

'' Ungava I Atla I It was a dreadful dream ! 



UNGAVA. 65 

As wild as chief e er dreamed sleeping over- 
tired on some old battle plain. I will arise 
and wash my heated face with cooling water. 
I would I knew where water runs that might 
this dreadful dream wash from my memory ! " 

Then in the ice-cold tide that ran in pleas- 
ant murmurs down the cavern's side he bathed 
his heated face and cooled the fever in his 
eyes, and, thus refreshed, stood gazing down- 
ward musing — when suddenly he stooped, 
and with observant eye studied the cavern's 
floor, and said : 

" By sacred' sign on rifle stock I swear that 
litde imprint there was outlined by Ungava's 

^ Many of the rifles among the northern Indians and 
trappers, partly from priestly influence, perhaps, and 
partly from religious or superstitious motives personal to 
the owner, have the cross carved or painted on them. 



66 UNGA VA. 

foot ! See ! Heel and forefoot have left mark, 
but the arched interval between, too high and 
firm for weight to flatten, has left the dust un- 
stirred. The savior of my life did stand and 
watch me as I slept ! Aye, she with face like 
purest snow, and gloomy soul as it were ever 
under shadow, and eyes that hold within their 
fringes, jet as night, the sorrow of a world long 
dead, who out of old-time grave and instant 
death did snatch me, did watch and ward keep 
over me in sleeping. What may I ever do to 
balance up the scales that now so heavily slope 
obliquely in her favor? She said great service 
must I do for her. I, standing in that dreadful 
tomb, chilled and weakened nigh to death, did 
give her word and bond if she should lead me 
to the upper world where I might see the sun 
once more and feel the air blow strongly on my 



UA'GAVA. 67 

cheek, she should be angel to me evermore. 
That word and bond thus given will I keep if 
hand or heart of mine may keep it this side 
death, or on beyond it. But, God of heaven, 
what is this ? That impress in the Polar fur 
where lay my head ! If death were settling 
darkly in my eyes, through dying film and 
glaze well should I know that little trail. 
There stood Ungava. Here above my head 
did Ada stand. My God, that they, my savior 
and my Love, should in this chamber stand 
together over me, and I sleep on ! Am I on 
earth, or spirit land ? — What may this visita- 
tion mean ? " 

Then as he musing stood Ungava came with 
noiseless step into the chamber, and gliding to 
his side she gently said : 

" Trapper, twice has the sun come to the 



68 UNGA VA. 

earth and gone since thou did'st sleep, and 
now the moon shines whitely on the world. 
If thou art rested, we will go and thou shalt 
look upon her beauty and shalt hear the 
music of the sea which rolls its rhythm under 
sounding cliffs. What troubles thee ? Hath 
not thy sleep been sound and restful ? " 

'' Sound, sound it was in truth, O thou 
whose face is as the moon, my savior and 
my angel : but, O Ungava, as I slept strange 
dreams did come ! " 

''Dreams?" said Ungava. ''What dreams 
did vex thy sleep, may I not know ? " 

" Aye, aye," he cried, " thou shalt know 
all. For thou do'st love me and art wise 
beyond the wisdom of dull, earthly man. 
Perchance thou can'st the riddle read and 
tell me what the vision means." 



UNGA VA. 69 

Then calmly she: "Say on, and tell me 
all. No doubt I can the riddle read and 
give its meaning." 

Then solemnly the Trapper said : 
" Ungava, listen. As I lay, my senses 
locked in slumber deep, — so deep I doubt 
if roar of coming battle would have stirred 
me, — forgetful of all earthly happenings as 
the dead : suddenly I seemed to hear the 
sound of music coming through the air in 
strangest song by dead or living heard, — 
a song sung for my soul ! In answer to that 
song my soul did leave my bosom and slowly 
rising stand, as a thing unseen, above me. 
Then voices did I hear. Questions that my 
ears could not retain were asked and answered. 
Some soul was seeking of my soul for knowl- 
edge which it would or could not give ; and all 



70 UNGAVA. 

the world around me was as are the heavens 
when the clouds above Ungava's torrent tides 
at sunrise roll upward rosy red. Then, sud- 
denly, the voices ceased ; my soul sank down- 
ward to its mortal home within my breast ; the 
red clouds faded, and I knew no more until 
I woke. Spirit of knowledge, tell me what 
it was I heard or seemed to hear. What is 
the meaning of this dreadful dream ? " 

Then said she, lightly, " Dear friend, thou 
wast o'er-tired. Thy body had been sorely 
taxed, and all thy senses tumbled into sleep 
as shot bear tumbles over edge of cliff and 
at the base dies struggling. It was a fever 
vision, an unreal distortion of the fancy ; 
nothing more. Forget it." 

Then did the Trapper, strongly moved, place 
hand upon her shoulder, and exclaim : 



UNGAVA. 71 

" Ungava, I can see some dread is on thee, 
and from fear of hurting- me thou holdest back 
the truth. Thy soul is wiser than thy words. 
Look at that imprint in the film of dust upon 
the floor. There did my body lie. There at 
my feet thy foot did come and stand. Were 
I on dying bed, with dying gasp I'd swear that 
thy white moccasin did'st make that imprint 
on the floor. That is not all. Angel of my 
life ! Savior in hour of death ! Look here, 
here in the snowy fur of this white polar's 
skin, see ! see that footprint where a little foot 
did leave its tell-tale outline in the yielding 
hair ! Whose foot made that ? There at my 
feet, Ungava, as I slept, did'st thou or thine 
own spirit stand. And here, by Him who made 
the world, were I at judgment bar, with hell be- 
fore me, I would swear, upon this skin, seen or 



72 UNGA VA. 

'unseen by you, with arms outstretched above 
to shield or claim, did my sweet Atla stand ! 
My God ! what does it mean ? " 

Whiter than winding sheet her face beside 
his, gazing, grew. One hand clutched breast 
as if to tear it open. Back from her shoulder 
stretched her other arm, rigid and stiff. The 
hand was clinched in horror. Her widely 
opened eyes bulged wildly prominent — two 
orbs of black surprise. Then into air her 
white hands did she dash, and such a scream 
burst out of mouth as never shredded air 
before. And hurling wand from quivering 
hand, she dashed from out the chamber as 
if upon her had come down, like bolt from 
heaven, an overwhelming fear or shame. 



CHAPTER IV. 

THE WIZARD OF THE NORTH.^ 

T N his vast chamber, vaulted high, whose 
ledge-Hke sides were knobbed with metals, 
precious stones, gold, silver pale, pyrites of 
iron, garnets, blocked crystals, diamonds bar- 
baric, stones of blood and countless gems, 
and from whose dome stalactites pendent 
hung, sat the Great Wizard of the North. 
This caverned hall was Nature's marvel. It 
was as if some god before first day and night 
had been, when chaos ruled, and all the globe 
was soft as heated mud, with hands whose 
palms were wide as landscapes, had in wildest 

freak or wanton merriment, with strength gi- 

73 



74 UNGAVA. 

gantic, flung all metals known to forming 
nature down in showers, and laughed to see 
them fall into the stiffening ooze, which, hard- 
ening, held fast the treasure -trove of mighty 
mirth. Thus, w^hen the cavern v/as by shock 
volcanic formed, its sides and vaulted roof 
wide-spanned and high were weighted with 
the wealth of empires. In this vast chamber 
thus adorned, rich in barbaric splendor, the 
Wizard of the North, her grandsire. Ancient 
of Days, whose stay on earth v/as thrice the 
lenofth of mortal man's, sat in his awful chair 
— a seat of power which had come down from 
primal days, huge and high, carved with weird 
shapes, bristling with polished horns whose 
every point shone like a star — on jet-black 
pavement placed, upon whose lustrous gloom 
was traced in gold the sacred circle of the 



UNGAVA. 75 

Zodiac. His hair was white as whitened wool. 
His face was pale with years and thought 
and study of deep things. His eyes were 
living blackness. Above them brows of snow 
projected. On one thin hand there shone 
such stone as never man beheld, which flashed 
and glowed, changed color fitfully, then veiled 
its splendor in dull red, and slept. Anon its 
mystic fires would blaze again, and hot and 
hotter burn until they flamed the hand with 
splendor. Within the other hand, laid listless 
on his lap, was rod of that old mystic metal 
which to our modern ignorance is but a name, 
but once, with its strange powers, was known 
to men and had high use. In it were noises 
constant, as of snapping fire, and ever now 
and then a spark shot forth. Nor lacked it 
power to move and lift the hand that held it. 



76 UNGAVA. 

It was strange rod. A living proof of ancient 
mystery which startled Egypt into justice, if 
sacred text be true.' Thus, in strange state 
and style, the mighty Wizard of the North, 
the weird embodiment of powers and arts and 
vital agencies beyond the ken of moderns, 
sat musing, lost within himself. Then opened 
he his mouth and, as one holding audience 
with himself, he said : 

" I know not what it means ! Thrice has 
the Rod stood upward in my listless palm, 
unmoved by me ! Not for a hundred years 
has this old symbol on my hand, instinct 
with primal sense, burned with such fierce 

^ Exodus, vii. chap. lo, ii, 12. — "And Aaron cast 
down his rod before Pharaoh and before his servants, 
and it became a serpent. Then the magicians of Egypt 
cast down every man his rod, and they became ser- 
pents ; but Aaron's rod swallowed up their rods." 



UNGAVA. 77 

and fitful fires. Twice past me since I sat 
within this chair my ears have caught the 
sound of flitting feet. They came In haste, 
and when they went, they flew. I fek, but 
could not see the presence pass. It must be 
so. One of that race which planted earth 
with power and beauty and high knowledge 
has drawn a line across the distances, so 
vast that llcrht Itself micrht never shaft the 
mighty intervals, and In this cave has come 
and gone ! There Is not other one unless 
of that one race, In living-land or dead-land, 
my eyes might not behold In passing. Nor, 
of that race Is one, unless she be of that 
old queenly line that lifted gods unto their 
throne, and by that graclousness did make 
them greater. But wherefore ? What Is there 
here for them or one of them, that she should 



78 UNGA VA. 

leave her throne, which, were its glory ten- 
fold brighter than the sun's, is yet so far 
removed from this small earth that not a 
point of light might tell its place or glory 
to a mortal's eye ? What soul is here which 
through such space could send or call forth 
message ? The chief of Mistassinni, withered 
and old, sleeps out of weakness unto strength, 
waiting for foe and chance. The Trapper, a 
vital man and primal in the greatness of his 
nature, but humble, and content with chase 
and hound and honest fight and mortal cir- 
cumstance, sleeps to the music of the falling 
rill, lulled into slumber by Ungava's song. 
She, under fate to serve him, as higher spirit 
lower, caught in the eddy of a mortal passion, 
spins struggling round, and wildly seeks to 
know the issue ere it comes. These three 



UNGAV/I. 79 

are here. No more. Why should a mighty 
throne in distant universe be moved by what 
is here, to visit, invisibh, this earthly cavern ? 
There lifts the Rod again ! The Ring burns 
hot as fire! What means it? Hist! I hear 
the stroke of flying feet and rush of garments. 
It is. It is. Ungava flying comes ! " 

Thus from the chamber and his presence 
fled she terror-stricken, filled with shame, that 
she had been observed by one unseen of 
her when she revealed her soul to his, seek- 
ing to know her destiny. Wild with fear »he 
fled as flees the fawn, when by his yell the 
springing panther is revealed, — a ball of 
tawny fury falling through the air, above It 
feeding. So she with flashing feet fled fast, 
her garments streaming as streams the plum- 
age of a pheasant sailing on, until she came 



8o UNGAVA. 

to that high hall where, in his chair of mystic 
state, there sat the Wizard of the North, her 
grandsire, pondering on ancient things and 
signs that stirred his soul. Into his awful 
presence wildly did she burst, and with white 
face and hand high lifted, before him stood 
and cried : 

" Sire of my sire, Ancient of Days, who 
hath the early and lost knowledge ' of the 

^ It is by no means improbable that, as the great 
prophets, seers, sorcerers, or wizards — call them what 
you please — of all j^eoples and times have claimed, 
there was in the beginning of the world a far closer 
connection between this earth and the invisible worlds, 
than now is provable. In all sacred literatures, whether 
Christian, Jewish, or Pagan, — so called by us whose 
pride is equalled only by our ignorance of primal things, 
— this claim is boldly made, and miracle-working, or 
the doing of things outside the regular course or order 
of nature, is made, in them all, the very basis of the 



UNGAVA. 81 

world and all Its power on dead and living, 
tell me, thou who taught me mystery and 
armed my hand with Rod of power and to my 
lips gave incantations that out of ashes of 
old urns and dust of ancient eraves can call 
forth those who once with life did warm the 
mouldered clay, and from the bosom of the 

structure around which they, as the verbal expression, 
have grown. It is evident to all scholars that back of 
what is known as modern civilization were other and 
more perfect ones, whose very ruins are a marvel to 
us all. It would seem that as we are only mere copyists 
in architecture, so we are only borrowers from the past 
of all that is really valuable in our faiths and moral 
code. No one with a heart can but lament that there 
is to-day no connection, whatever, in the form of com- 
munication, between those who live on the earth and 
our loved ones who live beyond it. The great loss 
that has fallen on man is this entire loss of the old-time 
connection with the invisible world. 



82 UNGAVA. 

living summon the soul articulate, and to my 
eyes didst give the sight which sees through 
space and graves : tell me, if in the universe 
there moves a body or a soul that, coming 
out of living-land or dead-land, can stand 
within arm's reach of me and not be seen ? " 
So cried she standing in her fright before 
him. 

Then he in answer : 

" Ungava, daughter, last of my race, born 
unto dubious doom, to whom I have revealed 
the mysteries of life and death, and taught 
those ancient arts which give to lip and hand 
an awful power, and to thine eyes the sight 
that looketh, seeing, into graves and far be- 
yond ; what has disturbed thy soul ? What 
power has baffled ? Tell me plainly all, that I 
may plainly answer." 



UNGA VA. 83 

Then she In haste, awe- stricken, made 
reply : 

"The Trapper slept. I am a woman and 
I love him. The threads of fate spun at my 
birth are tangled with his own. If he shall 
love me, happy will my life go on and happy 
will it end. I then shall be as mortal woman 
having lived and loved. My children will come 
after and our race be endless. If not, I do 
lose all that earth holds for a woman, and I 
die unmated, and in loneliness I shall live on 
forever. The rill with soothing murmurs fell. 
I sang him soothing song. He slept. Above 
him sifted I the dust which brings oblivion to 
mortal sense. Then from his breast I sum- 
moned forth his soul and questioned it if it 
might tell me, if my destiny were joy or woe. 
His souJ obeyed me and made answer as I 



84 UNGAVA. 

asked. I went. He woke. I came again. 
He was disturbed in soul. My spell was 
almost broken by some other spell. Some 
other power, most potent, had almost, by a 
dream, betrayed me. I was amazed, but 
passed it lightly off. In vain, for, in the 
dust where I had stood he pointed to my 
footprints, and did say, 'There didst thou or 
thy spirit stand as I lay slumbering.' Then 
to another footprint plainly pressed into the 
yielding fur of the white skin on which his 
head was laid, he pointed, and exclaimed, 
' Here, with arms outstretched above my 
head to shield or save, did my own Atla 
stand.' 

'' Sire of my sire, great Seer and Prophet, 
who is this Ada .^ What spirit is there in the 
universe more strong than I, when standing, 



UNGAVA. 85 

Rod in hand, in incantation ? Tell me, by 
Ring and Rod, if one there is in living-land 
or dead-land that can stand within arm's reach 
of me at such a moment, seeing, and remain 
unseen by me ? " 

Long sat he without speech. The Rod 
moved in his hand and from the Ring there 
blazed a flash of conscious flame. His eyes 
were fixed upon her startled face. Slowly 
and soundless moved his lips. At last he 
murmured, as murmuring to his soul : 

" Atla ? Atla ? Ada-ntis ! ' Is, then, ,the 

1 This refers to the belief of many scholars and those 
who have thoughtfully, with learned minds, examined the 
subject first broached by Plato, that in the Atlantic Ocean, 
stretching westward from the coast of Africa, was a great 
continent-island called Atlantis, from wdiich the Atlantic 
Ocean derived its name, and that in this island the 
human race began its career. 



S6 UNGA VA. 

old race gone from earth they loved and 
ruled, forever? Is that first tree of knowl- 
edge stripped to Its last sweet leaf? It must 
be so. How did it read ? Alas ! How many 
years and graves have sifted down their smoth- 
ering dust upon that sentence since 'twas said. 
Can I recall it ? Aye, now it comes. ' The 
last and be.st shall bear the name of Af other- 
land.' Atla, the last of that great queenly 
line, is dead, and with her died her race. Un- 
gava lives, and with her lives her race, — per- 
haps. Now see I all. Now read I well the 
riddle. 'Love cuts all knots, and love may 
out of fate deliver! If he may love her?" 
Then to Ungava plainly did he say : 
" Ungava, daughter, listen. I now will tell 
you gravest things. We must take deepest 
council. In the beginning two races were on 



UNGA VA. ^y 

earth, the earth-born and the visitant. In 
union were they joined and from the union 
two other races sprang. Ours was not great- 
est. The other greater was. It held the cra- 
dle of the world, and hence, prolific, sent its 
children toward the setting sun and south- 
ward. Our race the other was, and we came 
northward, which then was Summer- Land. 
Thus separate, divided, each of the two held 
to its own development in power and rank. 
Ours was the lesser, always. They built on 
reason and present things. We on the future 
world, credulous and superstitious ever. This 
Atla is the last and greatest of that race and 
its old queenly line, as thou art last of that 
religious Caste with us, that holdeth Rod and 
Ring of power. By some strange chance she 
must have met this Trapper, and have loved. 



88 t/NGAVA. 

From distance greater than the farthest star 
from earth a thousand times, as you did sum- 
mon forth his soul to claim it, she, hastening 
hither, flew. I heard her come and go, invis- 
ible to eyes to which all graves are only mir- 
rors. This Rod did lift and bow obedient 
as she passed, and on my trembling hand 
the conscious Ring flashed startled recogni- 
tion. She, she it was w^ho stood above the 
Trapper's head, unseen of you. Greater than 
we, she is. Her power is stronger. Ungava, 
Atla is your rival, and she knows all ! '* 

Then stood she white in dumb amaze at 
what her ears had heard. Atla her rival, and 
Atla had seen all ! Who was this Atla ? 
Where was she and where was she not ? 
Perhaps e'en now her mighty orbs were on 
her ! What mioht she do ? 



UNGA VA. 89 

Then to her, standing- thus all white with 
fear, her grandsire came. He took her hand 
and gravely said : 

'' My daughter, child of a race that dieth 
with thee if thou diest without issue, on yon- 
der couch of skins I pray thee seek some 
needed rest. Thou art oer-taxed. This mat- 
ter leave to me. It needs grave thought and 
deepest wisdom, lest by blunder we lose all. 
Sleep thou in peace. I will the Trapper sum- 
mon here and tell him much of ancient times 
and things. I will observe his soul, and at 
the last lead up to thee. Such man as he 
was never on this earth, if, seeing thee as he 
shall see, knowing thee as he shall know, his 
soul shall not in love or pity give itself to 
thee. So on this couch convenient let now 
thy frame repose. Close eyes ; yield mind 



90 UNGAVA. 

and thought to me. While with entreating 
and persuasive gesture I from thy soul draw 
trouble and call sweet slumber down. So, 
gently does she pass from ills that are and 
thoughts of ills to be into that realm that 
lies beyond the line of mortal sense and 
pain. I would that when she wakes she 
might awake into a world of equal peace." 



CHAPTER V. 

THE conjurer's ACCOUNT OF THE GENESIS ' OF 
THE WORLD. 

'' TTERE have I brought you, Trapper, that, 
in answer to your questioning, I might 
narrate the Genesis of the world, and tell you 
of the races which earliest dwelt on earth ; of 
that first innocence which represented God, 

^ Whatever the reader may think of this as an accu- 
rate history of the beginning of the world and the " Fall 
of Man,'' it can doubtless be regarded as accurate as, and 
certainly more philosophic than, the one to which Milton 
stands sponsor in his " Paradise Lost ; " that magnificent 
fiction of imagination, which has imposed a theology upon 
the Christian world which for the most part is diametri- 
cally opposed to good sense and sound Scripture both. 

91 



92 UA^GA VA. 

and how it fell ; of arts and powers once known, 
now lost to men, and of that primal truth 
which underlies religions, superstitions, creeds, 
and is to them what vital element is to human 
blood. Here sit thou down, and, while Un- 
gava sleeps, I will rehearse the tale of olden 
times, and you shall know the lore of that 
old world which is forever gone and all the 
glory of that race which once shone on the 
heads of millions, but which, like candle burnt 
to socket, now flickers feebly in two feeble 
lives. Never before, beyond the limits of our 
Caste did this old lore go forth ; but you shall 
know the truth as it has come from mouth to 
mouth in sacred speech and accurate, from 
those who saw and knew whereof they told. 
I tell you, hoping it may live when she and 
I are numbered with the stars. 



UNGA VA. 93 

''This, then, was in the beginning, and this 
the cause and order of that first development 
whose ruined glory is to-day a marvel. 

'* No art or science, Trapper, worth the name 
was ever born on earth. All have come down 
from races throned amid the spheres, who, 
through unnumbered ages, had clomb slowly 
up the slopes of fine intelligence, and terraced 
Heaven with knowledge. When these on 
wing inquisitive in downward flight came to 
the earth, with them they brought all knowl- 
edge and all grace, and planted here .the 
germs of needed progress. By these the 
earth in infancy was taught. Knowledge was 
borrowed from the skies. The seeds of 
every precious growth were sown widecast 
from hands whose skill eternity had taught. 
Through these superior ones the earth did 



94 UNGA VA. 

gain and lose all worth the having. From 
them it gained the skill to build, to fashion, 
and to mould ; and traces of their mighty 
work are found to-day in ruins wide as acres, 
in forms that stand gigantic in the forests of 
the East, in jungles which once were gardens 
of the gods, in mountains disrupted by volcajiic 
shocks, but which, smooth-sloped and joined 
by intervals of verdure, once gave summer 
residence to those who longed to breathe the 
cooler airs from snowy summits blown, that 
are a wonder. Men stand and gaze at them 
astounded, not knowing what hand or skill 
could shape and hew such mighty sculptures. 
From them, too, came the knowledge of the 
skies. They were the Stars of Morning who 
sang the heavens into place and named to 
human ears the constellations. They fixed 



UNGAVA. 95 

the orbit of the earth ; called time from out 
eternity by measurement of day and night, of 
months and years ; and zoned the earth by 
temperatures. They did unfold the mystery 
of the magnet circle around which sweeps the 
restless steel, and so gave courage unto men 
to push their ships beyond the sight of land, 
sail far and wide through pathless oceans, 
bravely trusting life and gold to a sliver of 
thin metal, thus giving birth to commerce 
which stands parent to the brotherhood of 
man. From them, too, came the arts of heal- 
ing ; the use of poisons, which, left untouched 
till time of need, are antidotes to death ; the 
knowledge of all herbs medicinal, which give 
to every pain and ache its healing leaf; of 
oils, which, penetrating joint and bone, drive 
out the lurking pain, or, spread as ointment 



96 l/NGA VA. 

on the skin, pink it with health and smooth 
all wrinkles out, — those scars of smitinof for- 
tune ; of perfumes, how distilled, how min- 
gled, how preserved, that out of many sweets 
perfected sweets may come, that mortals might 
be charmed from joys of grosser to those of 
finer senses. From them, moreover, knowl- 
edge came of metals, where found, how worked 
and manufactured into forms of use and orna- 
ment according to the laws of high utility and 
taste. They taught the laws of architecture 
unto men ; the principle of the arch. — that 
key of utmost strength ; the column, plain or 
fluted, — that symbol of high stateliness ; the 
crowning capital which flowers the stony stalk 
with airy beauty ; and how tall tower and min- 
aret and steeple and the rounded dome should 
shape the massive structure underneath into 



UxVGAVA. 97 

proportions rhythmic. The cereals that give 
food to man were from the wild abundance 
of material chosen and by careful culture prop- 
agated unto perfection. Last of all, they taught 
them written language, symbolic and phonetic 
both. First in pictures,' that their childish 
eyes might be enticed to learn and easily catch 
sense from shade of color and from shape. 
Then in arbitrary forms which were for scholars, 
ranges of high thought and universal traffic 
in ideas answering universal needs ; that all 
the race, in all its tribes and families, in every 
zone remote and clime distinct, might by one 
universal avenue come at last, as after tri- 

^ Probably the oldest language or method of commu- 
nicating thought was that of signs, or pantomimic, next 
to which, beyond doubt, stands the " Picture Language," 
which we find carried to perfection in the hieroglyphics 
of Egypt. 



98 UNGA VA. 

umph, marching into apprehended brother- 
hoods In all these ages of celestial teaching, 
Trapper, the future was not hidden from the 
present nor dead from living. They did come 
at call and ghostly terrors were not known. 
The earth-born died ; but not as those whose 
lives have ended, but have just begun. The 
heavenly ones died not until within immortal 
veins death entered, as I will tell, by wrong, 
unfit admixtures of the lower with higher 
blood. Of this I will now speak. 

"Trapper, religions change. They flood and 
ebb like tides. The old die out and new ones 
come. They are deciduous. A thousand 
years, — which in the cycle of existent things 
are only as are years to centuries, — their 
leaves, nutritious, medical, fall for the healing 
of the nations, then they leafless, sapless 



UNGA VA. 99 

Stand, and are from habit worshipped for 
other thousand years, though out of them all 
power for good is gone, and the once vital 
growth for human need stands, cold and 
bare, a rigid system of devout formality. The 
Deity changes also with the changes of the 
human mind, growing and shrinking as it 
grows and shrinks in knowledge. Men of 
different climes and ao^es o^ive Him different 
names and nature. Now He is this, now that. 
According as they know or dream or feel, so 
is He. Man makes his Deity, and worships 
the pictured idol of his mind whether false 
or true, and, worshipping, grows into likeness 
of his idol whether o-ood or bad. 

'' But, Trapper, listen and remember what I 
say ; for it is true. Back of all these changes 
and these picturings of men, good, bad, or both 



TOO UNGAVA. 

or neither, there stands forever the Eternal 
Power who made and makes all things by 
spoken word immediate or slow evolving law, 
as seemeth to Him good and answereth His 
own purpose best. The / A^n of the Jew, 
the Zeus of Greece, the Jove of Rome, the 
Sacred Fire of Persia, the Odin of the North, 
the Manitou of Red Man, the God of Chris- 
tian is evermore the same; the One Great 
Deity, the Cause, Creator, Ruler, Preserver 
of universal man, animals and things. We 
know He is our Father. That is all we know. 
The propagating principle strikes its deep 
root into His own white vitalness, and from 
it draws unintermittent sap and is forever 
active. Beyond this simple fact, self-evident, 
we nothing know. All else is born of fancy, 
wish or ignorance, or that infernal pride and 



UNGAVA. lOI 

cruelty of scheming, grasping priestcraft, which 
manufactures attributes of terror, digging hells 
and walling heavens in, that it may hold the 
keys of them and dominate, through fear, 
the lives of women and the souls of men. 
"This world was made by Him, not as a 
special act, to loom forever, vast and high, 
in the blue sky of universal sight ; nor as a 
theatre on whose eye-compelling stage great 
tragedy is played that He might make exhibit 
of His Love and Power : for He is always 
making worlds innumerable and filling them 
with races, as He, in summer, fills meadow- 
land with fiowers. For when He made, He 
made it as a residence and home for earth- 
born and for spirits both, who, for ages num- 
berless, uncalendared, had grown in grace and 
knowledge of finest arts and holy things ; 



I02 UNGAVA. 

and these to earth came down to give the 
new earth knowledge and to teach the lowly 
ones of clay the science of pure life and lay 
in law and helpful order broad and deep the 
strong foundations of development, that they 
in time might grow to their estate and so 
have freedom of the Universe. Thus was it, 
Trapper, and no other way, as I and other 
like me have had from record, memory-kept, 
handed down to us from that first day when 
they, the Stars of Morning, sang welcome to 
the new-made world and songs of praise to 
Him, the Maker. 

"• So was it at the first. The earth was free 
to all, and heavenly ones came down as knowl- 
edge comes to ignorance, to teach it and as- 
sist. These were the White Ones of the world, 
the mighty Sons of God, and were, by right 



UNGA VA. 103 

of knowledge and of power, the rulers of the 
earth. They taught it science, gave it laws, 
transmitted hither arts of building and of heal- 
ing, tested the qualities of earthly things, — 
its minerals, ores and precious gems, — divided 
base from pure, measured the orbit of the 
earth, its axis calculated and fixed its place 
among the constellations which rule its mo- 
tion, and gave them names familiar to the 
ears of lower earth-born men.' These mighty 

^ It is plain that in early ages mankind were divided 
into Totemic sects or families bearing animal names. 
From this arose the fables of animals having human 
speech. When we read in some old author that the Fox 
talked with the Crow or the Wolf to the Sheep, it simpl}^ 
means that a man of the Fox Totem or Tribe talked 
with a man of the Crow Tribe, or one of the Wolf fam- 
ily with one who bore the Sheep as his Totem or family 
name. It would be natural, as Astronomical knowledge 
grew and stellar discoveries were made, that the forming 



I04 UNGAVA. 

ones, these teachers from the skies, these wise 
and holy beings were the gods of earth, and 
so they stand to-day in all the ancient litera- 
tures, — grotesque, weird, meaningless, because 
their cause, their order and their old sienifi- 
cance are lost and scattered, crudely woven 
into later superstitions, — mere shreds and 
patches of a glorious fabric that once was 
perfect whole.' 

constellations should receive these Totemic names, in 
compliment, perhaps, to the Tribes or Nations that bore 
them. It is as if astronomy were now forming the con- 
stellations and grouping the starry systems and should 
call one the Constellation of England, and another of 
Russia, instead of Saturn or Orion. 

^ The Mythologies of Greece and Rome are unques- 
tionably based on great facts of personal existences and 
actual history that belong to remotely early ages. Nep- 
tune, Jove, Hercules, Mars, Vulcan, these were all once 
men, kings, rulers, noted benefactors of the human race 



UNGAVA. 105 

"Now hearken. When first the Sons of 
God, the gifted ones of Heaven, came visi- 
tant to earth, — wliich was not till the slow 
evolving movement of creation had, through 
ages long, circled its full sphere, and earth 
and all its creatures perfect stood, — they 
found on earth a race of beings strangely 
born. They had come upward by evolving ' 

and not mere creations of the fancy of Grecian and 
Roman poets. They are the shades or ghosts of once 
hving, substantial persons, whose natural forms are lost 
to the historic eye in the dim distances of unrecorded 
times and so are therefore seen in grotesque misshapen- 
ness. 

^ This old Nasquapee Conjurer or Prophet had evi- 
dently a pretty correct conception of Darwin's system 
or idea of evolution. It might be interesting to inquire 
whence he derived his knowledge so closely in accord- 
ance with advanced modern thought on the development 
of the human species. 



I06 UNGAVA. 

growth and were of many orders. Each bore 
in mind or mood, in body sturdy or Hght, a 
dim resemblance to his or her original. In 
each, by motion, look, by style of voice or 
eye, by color, management of form or char- 
acteristic passion, was hint of prototypes in 
distance hidden. 

" Some were as tigers, fiercely strong and 
beautiful with wild and savage beauty, soften- 
ing into purring moods at times, and sweet 
maternal tendernesses. Some were lithe and 
subtle as the snake when, sinuous and glossy- 
with new skin, he charms the innocent bird to 
his keen fangs. Some had the haughty lone- 
liness of the snow-headed eagle, and his eye 
to gaze undazzled at the sun, when, soar- 
ing high o'er cloud and shade through crys- 
tal air with steady wing in level flight, he 



l/jVGAVA. 107 

grazes its hot rim and glances, with shrill 
scream of challenge, onward ; — that scream 
which hunters trailing on in silence hear 
come hissing, tearing downward like a burn- 
ing arrow, and wonder what the awful sound 
may be and w^hence it came. Swift and strong- 
to sw^oop and strike w^ere they, and death flew 
with their shadow. Nor lacked these earth- 
born races skill to make and build, for they 
were cunning with the cunning of the bee and 
ant and those winged architects which weave 
their homes from textile hair, from gossamer 
floss or floating fibres, and hang them pen- 
dent by shrewd fastening from the swaying 
bough. But they were fickle, fierce or igno- 
rantly weak, and had no common language 
and lacked the mind to organize and push 
on and up to final finish what they set hand 



I08 UNGAVA. 

to. So nothing of their doing was carried 
to perfection, or broadly based to stand the 
wear of time and shocks of change. Hence 
all they did fell down in ruin ere 'twas done, 
and all their progress was in circles mov- 
ing round and round in endless imperfec- 
tion. 

'' But of their women, there were some 
whose loveliness was hued and odored like 
the earth, their mother, when amorous warmth 
sweetens her swellinof breasts with bloom and 
spice ; and pungent odors fill the nose with 
pleasure and with longing for more and deeper 
inhalations. Dark were these women, but glo- 
rious as the night when through its spaces of 
warm dusk the stars are powdered thick and 
all its swarth is flushed with latent light and 
heat. Some were superbly calm, — their move- 



UNGAVA, log 

ments as the swan's, slow, stately, proud, re- 
poseful as still pools vine-bordered, starred 
with lilies, — on whose bosoms, warm and 
sweet, a man might sleep forever nor wish 
to wake. Blooded were some like fire, veined 
with passions swarth as hot as torrid heat In 
jungles, electric as the night when all the 
gloom sweats odors which o'ercome the 
senses, and in it, latent, lurks the unkin- 
dled lightning. In some were strange mao-- 
netic powers, known or. unknown to them, 
and he on whom, when place and time and 
mood were apt, they slowly fixed their orbed 
eyes, half-closed, voluptuous, lost higher wit 
and virtue and every sense save sweet recep- 
tiveness, and yielding, overcome, did gently 
sink Into their gracefully lifted arms as Into 
sweetest heaven. Some won by gentleness 



no l/NGAVA. 

and goodness, being of mild natures, disposi- 
tions sweet, modest and shy as antelopes or 
the gazelle, and lovely as untutored grace 
might be and that sweet modesty which, star- 
tled at first thouorhts of love, shrinks timid 
from the sight of its own loveliness. These 
women of the Earth, novel to Heaven's sight, 
lifted eyes of homage to the Sons of God, 
wise, strong and holding kingly rank, and in 
the splendor of their beauty lay at their feet 
in humble worship, graceful, solicitous, entic- 
ing. Nor did they fail in their wild, natural 
wooing. For they were honest in it, being 
all enthralled with glorious face and form and 
spectacle of rank, and, more than all, their 
loveliness was great. So were the White 
Ones of the world, pure-blooded, deathless 
Sons of Godj drawn downward to the lower 



UAGA VA. Ill 

type in amorous admiration, and took of them 
wives as many as they chose.' 

''So ruin came to the first world and order. 
The pure crossed with the impure lost their 
purity for aye. The mountain streams flowing 
crystal from the fount of God, fell into valley 
pools and were forever roiled. The temper of 
the skies, serene and sweet, was roughened 
and made sour. The bright intelligence of 
Heaven, quick to invent, to see, to analyze, 
fashion and construct, was clouded ; the even 
disposition thrown from its poise, the just 
judgment warped, the holy, vital force to will 
and do, running clear from the Font of Life, 
grew thick with earthly mixtures. All cer- 

^ Genesis vi. 2. — The Sons of God saw the daughters 
of men, earth-born, that they were fair. And they took 
them wives of all which thev chose. 



112 i^ AGAVA. 

tainty of holy birth was lost. The propa- 
gating instinct, drawn from God, was turned 
against Him, for mongrelism,' — that worst 
and deadliest sin, corrupting all, — was lifted 
on to thrones that ruled the world, and, with 
power perverted ever after, helped to mar it. 
"So fell the race of God. So virtue went 
forever from the earth, and sin came in. The 

^ The practice of " out crossing " as it is called by 
breeders was, evidently, not favored by the Divine Pa- 
rent of the human race as he everywhere set law and 
custom against it. There is not a race that has ever 
gained, symmetrically, by marrying beyond its own blood. 
The pure-blooded, inbred races are those who reached and 
maintained a high level of excellence. The Jews, Egyp- 
tians, Greeks, Romans, Irish, might all be quoted in 
support of this position. The idea that a great, sym- 
metrically formed race can ever be built up in this Con- 
tinent on the basis of nationalized mongrelism is scouted 
by all history. God and history are alike against it. 



UNGAVA. 113 

leaders of the blind were blinded, and both 
fell down together into deepest ditch. As 
entered mortal mixtures into deathless veins, 
death entered, not as new birth from lower 
unto higher at full-time pregnancy, but as 
doom, and with each added birth there came 
new risk and ruin to mankind. Like poison- 
ous vapor out of noxious pools, rising cold 
and dank, death slowly up the shining slopes 
of tainted generations rose, until in darkness 
it enveloped all from basest hut to noblest 
throne. And thus with sin against pure blood 
came death into the world. 

''Thus the first glory of the world went down 
in ruin. The tree of knowledge, whose fruit 
your Scriptures say the woman ate, — a fable 
growing out of fact, a withered leaf of old- 
time knowledge, fragrant still, garnered by 



114 UNGAVA. 

poet out of Jewish lore, garnered by Jew in 
turn from literatures that had it full in prose 
and verse a thousand and ten thousand years 
before the day that Abraham or even Job 
drew breath, — was marriaore with the Gods, 
from which, — as was in nature sure to be, — 
came power to hand and knowledge into heart 
and head, which they, earth-born, untaught, 
undisciplined, weak or wicked, knew not how 
to use aright, or, knowing, because of evil in 
them, perverted it to evil use. The sin was 
not on woman, but on him, who, for his wan- 
ton pleasure, lifted her to marriage bed beyond 
her dignity, and to familiar sight of powers 
and forces, agencies and agents, that were 
"beyond her ken or skill to understand or use 
ariorht. She was forbid to taste the fruit of 

o 

that forbidden tree as childish ignorance, in- 



UNGAVA, 115 

quisltive, Is commanded not to touch the fire 
that burns. But more was he a hundred 
times forbid who Hfted her unto Its branches 
sweet with flower and odorous leaf, and put 
the luscious fruit Into her lono-ine mouth. 
The w^oman erred unconscious, striving to 
reach and have what to her senses was 
sweeter than the breath of life to nostril, ac- 
cording to the longing of her ambitious, 
ardent nature. But the man she tempted, or 
was tempted by, who did lift her up, from 
love or lust, unto the level of forbidden bed 
and all the life and knowledge which, through 
wifehood, motherhood and daily Intercourse, 
it gave, did sin against the dignity of his 
high nature and a law which In his clear in- 
telligence blazed warningly as blazes beacon 
fixed above the rocks of wreck and death. 



CHAPTER VI. 

THE WHITE GOD OF MISTASSINNI. 

^^n^HUS in the beginning gained the earth 

whatever it has had of glory. It gained. 

It lost. For of the minorline of the higher 

o o o 

with the lower, there came, not all at once 
but gradually, a lapse and weakening of that 
vital force which had come down from heaven ; 
a clouding of that bright intelligence which 
only cycles of eternity can give the seeking 
mind ; a lowering of the tone and level of 
ambition, which erst sought only noble ends ; 
and, worst of all, a lapse in holiness. The 
pure imagination was befouled, a grossness 
came to appetite, the moral sense was blunted 

ii6 



UNGAVA. 117 

— that sentinel of God, which, while it stood 
instinct with heavenly life, kept perfect guard 
above sweet innocence and trustful virtue. 

" So passed the ages, and the earth grew 
upward in external glory but downward into 
moral ruin. Then shocks were felt which 
shook the solid world. Catastrophes were 
multiplied. Here Fire, there Water, and at 
some other point Frost wrought its work of 
ruin. Chaos had come again. The Mother- 
land sank under sea, and with it went the 
treasures and the records of the primeval 
cycle. Here and there a colony survived 
and carried down to later ages some feeble 
fragments of the glorious whole that had 
been shattered into ruins. Only these sur- 
vived. The sphered excellence of high 
achievement, perfect in holiness, glorious as a 



Il8 L/AGAVA. 

globe illuminated, proof of what moral rectitude 

with mortal power might do, was lost forever. 

"Then out of space there came a vagrant 

world flying in unguided, lawless flight ; a 

world on fire, — a funeral pyre of some old 

race, perhaps — and as it passed, monstrous 

in size, flying faster by ten thousand times 

than this small globe wheels on, nigh to that 

point which now is northern pole, the home 

of Arctic cold, which then was Summer-land,' 

where dwelt, 'mid flowers that faded not and 

fruits that ripened for each day of the round 

year, my race ; it struck the earth, and in the 

twinkling of an eye my race became extinct. 

^ There is no possible way to explain the presence 
of many forms of tropic life found, by whalers and Arctic 
explorers, within the Arctic circle, save on the supposi- 
tion that a sudden and life-destroying change of climate 
came, in some prehistoric period, to the polar region. 



UiXGAVA. TTQ 

The level axis of the earth was, by the dread- 
ful shock, knocked obliquely up, the round 
of Nature's order changed, summer and winter 
rushed into alternate place, and transposed 
were the zones. Thus, Trapper, died the first 
two races of the earth. The one sank under 
water, and the legend of that flood is told 
in almost every language of the world.' The 

^ It is a remarkable fact that in Egyptian literature, 
historic or legendary, there is not the least hint of or 
allusion to the Flood. In Plato's "Atlantis" the aged 
Priest of the Temple at Sais who entertained Solon, 
Plato's grandfather, while living in exile out of Greece, 
accounts for this fully. He explained to Solon — I 
quote from memory — that the reason why Egypt had 
no special memory of the Flood was because there had 
been many such local catastrophes on the earth since 
the beginning, of which their records had knowledge, 
and that there was no legend about that special one 
because the facts of it were all fully known to them. 



T20 UNGAVA. 

Other perished under shock from heaven 
which crushed them on the instant. As falls 
the hammer on the anvil so death fell on 
them. They knew not it was coming till it 
came. Beneath that blow they and their 
mighty works were beaten into dust. The 
gravel of these northern wilds that mark the 
landscape is granulation of old palaces. We 
are within the circle of a ruin that buried half 
the world as you bury bodies under sand.' 

'* Here at Ungava, where fruits and flowers 
were then, there was a colony of that old 
race which lived in Summer-land of the 
North. This fringe of population, not wholly 
pure in blood but mixed with other races 

^ This certainly explains that mystery of the earth — 
the great geological puzzle — the Drift. Whence came 
it, when and how ? 



UNGAVA. 12 T 

which they met as they pushed southward, 
escaped, and so remained a feeble remnant 
of that primal stock that once held all the 
North. Trapper, this is enough. You know 
the past. I am of it and of that Caste which 
'mid the ancient folk held Sacred Keys of 
knowledge and of power preserved from ear- 
liest days, — a knowledge that knows all that 
has been, and a power that bridges death 
and brings across it at my call the feet of 
those who over it, amid the wailing of their 
friends, did pass to distant realms. One thing 
alone remains for me to tell. It is a modern 
happening, and gets significance from what 
it means to you and her. Listen now, and 
hear. 

'' When he who was the sire of the old 
tongueless chief of Mistassinni was but a boy, 



122 UXGAVA. 

he found, one morn at sunrise, on the beach 
of that great inland sea far westward of the 
lake where lived his tribe, a boy of his own 
age. He lay upon the sand as dead. His 
face was white as snow. His hair was eold. 
upon his bosom there was traced strange 
Totem, unknown to all the tribes. It was 
a double letter thus: — [ni%| — ^^"^ ^o^^^ ^e<^ 
as blood. He had come over sea in boat not 
built by hands ; at least, so seemed it to the 
tribes that knew no boat save such as their 
own hands had fashioned. That boy revived. 
The young chief fed and brought him by his 
hand unto the council chamber of his tribe, 
and all the ancients hailed him as fulfilment 
of a prophecy old as itself, that, ' After many 
years, out of the West, in boat not made with 
hands, should come a god white-skinned with 



UNGAVA. 123 

yellow hair.' Thus came unto the tribe of 
Mistassinni that 'White God,' as he is known 
through all the North. He grew in stature and 
in grace ; was fair to look upon, and wise. He 
learned their tongue ; his own was all unknown 
to them. He married princess of our Caste. 
A son was born. That son am I. To him was 
born a son of other princess, for our Caste 
weds within its circle and goes not beyond. 
That son had child. Enough of this ; we 
will go back. For of this ' White God ' would 
I tell, that )'ou may know him. Then would J 
a solemn question ask. 

" In battle he was chief. He was not laree 
in stature, but as the fight roared on and hotter 
grew he grew in size until at the white heat 
of it he filled the field. His presence was an 
atmosphere, which, being breathed, made those 



124 UNGAVA. 

who breathed It braver, so that each Hfted arm 
in the long ranks that saw him fight struck 
downward as if muscled to his shoulder. He 
flamed the fip-ht as licrhtnine, in mid-ocean, on 
some tempestuous night, flames the black bil- 
lows. No fear was in him. Battle to his 
soul was as weddino- hour to ardent lover. 
Through whirling hatchets, circling axes, 
brandished spears and arrows driving through 
the air like hail in winter, he would swoop 
as through the flying leaves, gust-whirled in 
autumn, eye fixed and talons set, the forest 
hawk swoops to his quarry. No man e'er 
lived on whom he set his blazing eye in bat- 
tle. In peace his face was sunny. Through 
his yellow beard his skin showed as a girl's. 
His eye was as a pool, on whose still surface 
lilies sleep unstirred by breath of wind. But 



UNGAVA. 125 

when it came to blows his face grew gray as 
steel, his eyes blazed bluish black as winter's 
sky, when all the warmth is frozen out of 
wave and star and heaven itself is pitilessly 
cold. But when the fight was over he would 
take his wounded foes and bear them to his 
tent and nurse them as a mother her sick 
child. Many he healed and with strong bodies 
they went home, to be his foes again and fight 
him on some other day. 

'' Once only was he merciless. It was that 
year that they of Mistassinni hunted seal on 
the west coast of wild Ungava, where the ebb 
and flood of icy tides are twenty times the 
height of man's full stature. One day a ship 
drove in whirled onward by a tempest from 
the north, through froth and foam that whit- 
ened her black hull a spear's length deep from 



126 UNGAVA. 

Stern to stem. Onward she drove before the 
whistling winds, her sails in tatters streaming 
in thin strips from spar and mast, until the 
mighty eddy, spinning round 'twixt a great 
island and main shore, dashed her, side on 
and downward, with a crash, as she were 
eider's ^gg, upon the beach in front of our 
encampment. One only of her crew survived 
the shock, and he, a giant, battle-axe in hand, 
stood on the sand unharmed. We gathered 
round him as he stood at euard, our seal 
spears pointed into sand that he might know 
we fought no man that had been flung by 
God's swift-handed mercy out of death.' 

^ The superstition of an Indian forbids him to kill 
one who, apparently, had had a miraculous escape from 
death. Many white men have escaped their vengeance 
because of this feeling. Captain Rogers, the noted scout, 



UNGAVA. 127 

''Then came our Leader slowly down the 
slope to where we stood, our peaceful spears 
in sand, a smile of welcome on his face and 
light of gladness shining in his eye. So cam.e 
he and within the circle of our mercy stood. 
But as his eye fell, at short distance, on the 
man, his face turned into ice. Its skin o-rew 
gray as steel. His eyes two orbs of fire be- 
came. From nighest girdle plucked he battle- 
axe and on the stranger stalked until he came 
within arm's reach. Then tore furred vest- 
ment from his breast until the dreadful Letter 
painted on his snow-white skin showed red as 
blood. So stood he posed. In one clinched 

who fell or slid safely down the front of the great cliff 
on Lake George, which was, because of his perilous feat, 
named after him, is one of the instances out of many 
which might be mentioned in this connection. 



128 UNGAVA. 

hand was fragment of torn skins, torn from 
his heart ; the other gripped the battle-axe. 
Thus in the hollow circle of our mercy stood 
the two, our God and giant stranger. Then 
out of sockets bulged the giant's eyes. The 
coarse skin of his cheeks did pallid grow. 
His black hair, rising slowly, lifted woollen 
cap from head. His big knees, bigger than 
joints of moose, shook under his huge bulk. 
A fit of trembling seized him. Down fell he 
on his knees while in his monstrous jaws rat- 
tled his teeth, fear-shook. Then out of qua- 
vering mouth there came a scream, ' Captain, 
have mercy ! ' Speechless still, our Leader, 
without word or sign, upward swung his axe 
and on the suppliant's head he brought it 
down so heavily that through the cloven crown 
its broad base sank to mangled jowl, and the 



UNGAVA. 129 

big bone handle flew in fragments to the 
striker's hand. Then, turning face upon us 
white as God's own wrath, he said, ' Throw 
this damned carcass into torrent swift and eddy 
deep, that they may whirl and float it where 
my father's soul beyond the northern straits 
waits to snatch it toward the mouth of hell 
and thrust his murderer in.' Trapper, thou 
art white man without cross, and of his race 
and speech. In battle thou art bigger, but no 
braver. Who was this White God of rocky 
Mistassinni ? Who was his father ? What 
the red Totem on his heart; the double Let- 
ter red as blood ? My power is blinded to 
this mortal thing. Beyond, I might see bet- 
ter. Can'st thou tell?" 

**Ay, ay," replied the Trapper. ''Prophet, 
well I know the race of this White God of Mis- 



130 UA'GAVA. 

tassinni, who was his sire, and what the double 
Letter on his breast did mean. The boy who 
came, wind-blown from out the sea, leagues 
west of Mistassinni, in boat not built b}^ mor- 
tal hand, — because not built of bark, — and 
lay at sunrise on the beach all wet and foul 
with brine and sand, and by the old Chief's 
grandsire there was found, adopted, wor- 
shipped as a god by all the tribes, was son 
of bravest man that ever trod a deck or 
chanced the dice with death that he mio-ht 
westward find a pathway for the commerce 
of the world and bring to know^ledge of the 
Cross of God the distant tribes of men. His 
name, old Seer, was Henry Hudson,' and the 

^ I can but refer the reader to the history of early 
navigators, of whom Henry Hudson was one of the 
bravest, for a full account of his sad fate and that of 



UNGAVA. 131 

monogram or Totem — call It as you please, 
as you be red or white — upon his breast, 
was the two first letters of his name cun- 
ningly blent in one. This boy the old Chiefs 
grandsire found upon the beach, was that 
sweet son of his, scarce more than child, 
who bravely by his father's side stood up, 
when by his crew, in cruel mutiny, the boat 
was pushed from his stout ship, that it might 
bear them, drifting, unto awful death. Ay, 
now I know why he vas merciless when on 
Ungava's beach his father's murderer knelt 
roaring for mercy. God ! what a blow in 
judgment did he strike, and how it eased 

his brave boy, when his mutinous crew forced him into 
an open boat and sent it adrift in the wild waters 
which now bear his name. Neither he nor his son 
was ever seen by white men after. 



132 UNGAVA. 

his soul. Prophet, thou art above the com- 
mon superstitions of the tribes, and I have 
told you truth. This fabled God of Mistas- 
sinni ; this White One of the North the 
tribes do worship, was Henry Hudson's son, 
a man of my own race and tongue, whose 
death has been a mystery for twice a hun- 
dred years. Go on and tell me all. This 
is great news. The world of letters and of 
men beyond these wastes of rock and leagues 
of rootless snow and ice will thrill with won- 
der when it learns from thee, through me, the 
fate of Hudson and his boy. Whom wedded 
he ? Were children born to him ? Are any 
of his name and blood alive, or is the line 
extinct ? Prophet, I swear that I would trail 
a trail until my head was white if at the end 
of it my eyes might look upon the face of 



UNGAVA. 133 

one within whose veins there flowed the noble 
blood of Hudson." 

Long sat the Prophet silently revolving in 
his mind what he had heard. His features 
lighted as a shuttered window, pane by pane, 
grows out of darkness, with the coming of 
the dawn. His eyes of night glowed under 
brows of snow as to the Trapper's face he 
lifted them. Then slowly out of parting lips 
there came the words, '' In cheek of snow 
that thou hast seen, John Norton, runs this 
mighty blood. Thy head need never whiten 
on the trail that leads thee to thy wish. The 
face that thou would'st see, lies there on 
yonder couch of skins. Ungava is the child 
of the White God. She ends the line." 

Then up the Trapper rose. His face white as 
Ungava's, as she lay unconscious on the couch 



134 UNGAVA. 

of skins whose fur was black as jet digged 
In the caves of night. A moment stood he 
dumb. Then said he, standinor straleht : 

'* Prophet, thou art a man of many days. 
Truth shoukl be on thy hps and fear of God. 
But thou do'st tell a tale so strange that to 
thy face I say I cannot credit It. Proof there 
must be of this ; proof sure as eye may see. 
Give me some proof that she, the savior of 
my life, is of the White God's blood, or I 
will go my way as one who hears an Idle 
story told." 

Then slowly from the chair of polished 
horns the Seer of many days with stately 
motion rose. His pale face paler grew% and 
his thin hand, on which the stone of mystic 
power blazed red, trembled with passion. 

'' Never before," he cried, " since from my 



[/AG A FA. 135 

sire, as God did take him,' received I ring of 
power and wand that burns because I will 
it, has mortal doubted word of mine, and 
lived. Thou art my guest and ignorant, thou 
mighty man, therefore I do forgive. Linked, 
also, is her soul with thine, and how or what 
the issue is to be, for good or ill, I know 
not. Hence let it pass. Do'st thou ask 
proof ; proof such as eye can see ? Come 
hither then. Fear not ; the trance in which 
she slumbers sweetly holds all senses locked. 
Behold, from breast of snow beneath which 
dwells her spirit pure as that white star that 
never moves from where it sentinels the cen- 
tre of all worlds and systems which move 
obedient round it, I lift this virgin vestment. 
Tell me, thou doubting man, do'st thou see 
^ " And Enoch was not, because God took him." 



136 UNGAVA. 

sign that cannot lie ? Is not Ungava child 
of the White God ? " And lo ! with starting 
eyes the Trapper saw, in color red as blood, 
the double Letter on her bosom white as 
drifting snow ! 

"■ Enough, enough," he cried in solemn 
tones. "It is enough. That is a sign that 
cannot lie. Ungava is the child of your 
White God ! By all I hope and long for 
in the world to come, I would we two had 
never met ! " 



CHAPTER VII. 

THE COUNCIL OP^ THE CHIEFS. 

'T^HEN came a runner, running from the 
south. O'er fields of sand ploughed by 
the winds in ridges ; over stretches of blocked 
ice, cracked into squares, blue, green, and white, 
— a strange mosaic of gigantic size, — he sped 
as if some dreadful death was speeding on his 
trail. From village unto village did he run, 
and as he ran he cried : 

'' To arms ! to arms ! the Esquimaux are 
coming ! A thousand warriors armed for 
fight, and at their head an ancient chief 
stalks on." 

So ran he and so cried his wild alarm. 

^37 



138 UNGAVA. 

Then roared the villages as roars the hollow 
log when some rude shock has startled hive 
within. The cry of woman and of child 
arose. It swelled in vengeful shrillness, stri- 
dent, fierce as eagle's scream. Out of each 
warrior's mouth there burst the battle yell, 
and hatchets edged for death flashed in the 
air. 

Then flocked the chiefs to council, and the 
Indian Parliament was held, — that place of 
high debate where nature's eloquence is heard 
and noble speech leads up to nobler deeds. 
No idle word is spoken there. No wily pol- 
itician counsels for self-gain. Each word is 
from the heart. Each sentence like sure 
stroke of axe ; and they who speak, speak 
for the good of all, and every statement or 
appeal is backed with readiness to die. 



UNGAVA. 139 

In the high hall of that old cavern they 
did meet. The man of ancient days sat in 
his awful chair, carved into shapes fantastic, 
weird, hewn from wood unknown among the 
timber of the world to-day, bristling with pol- 
ished horns whose every point shone like a 
star, and standing on the pavement black as 
night, whose gloom was lighted with the signs 
o{ Zodiac in brightest gold. On this strange 
seat, mysterious, the Wizard sat. Head of the 
Council. Upon his banded brows were horns 
of burnished gold. Midv/ay between their 
roots, large as a star, a diamond blazed. The 
mystic Rod was in his stronger hand. Upon 
the other gleamed the dreadful Ring, instinct 
with conscious fire. Pale was his face. His 
hair, snow-white as whitened wools, lay on 
his shoulders thin. Beneath his brows pro- 



T40 UNGAVA. 

jecting, glowed his eyes, bright with concen- 
trate light. 

Thus was he seated. On his rieht the 
Trapper sat, strong- featured, grave of face, 
observant. On his left, the Chief of Mistas- 
sinni, withered, bloodless, thin, as body that 
had risen out of old embalmment. Then in- 
ward filed, with slow and stately pace, the 
chieftains of the Nasquapees. Each in the 
solemn circle took his place. Each on the 
earth fixed eye and silent sat. No glance of 
fire, no moving lip was there. They sat as 
sit the dead in circle placed. The silence of 
the chamber might be felt. Thus sat they 
taciturn and grim, while hour-glass would 
have run its sands half out. 

Then slowly rose an aged chief. His head 
was gray with years, but straight he was as 



UNGAVA. 14X 

is the pine's trunk when its crest is shorn. 
Up rose he straight, and stood. Searched 
with his eye each tawny face with glance 
of fire ; cast blanket down until the To- 
tem showed above his heart ; and on his 
breast an ochred death's-head grinned ; then 
said : 

'' Men of Ungava, Nasquapees, straight 
standing men,' the hated Esquimaux are 

^ If you ask a Montagiiais Indian what Nasquapee 
means, he will tell you an atheist, or one who has no 
God, because the Nasquapees have no medicine-map. 
But if you ask a Nasquapee what his tribal name means, 
he will tell you " a man who stands straight." He will 
tell you, moreover, that he believes in two Great Spirits, 
a God and Evil One, and that the reason his tribe never 
had a medicine-man is because they have a great Prophet 
who is of the old race whence they all sprang, and that 
he knows all things and can call the dead back to life 
when he wishes. 



142 UNGAVA. 

coming ! I smell them in the air.' They 
stink like rotting seal. Their bodies lie un- 
buried like fish upon the banks of Peribonka, 
after freshet. They come to die. The blood 
of other days is in our veins. We of 
the Ancient Folk know how to fight. My 
knife Is thirsty. It knows where to drink. 
Look at my axe. See, it Is dull with rust. 
I'll brighten It to-morrow on their skulls. 
Whose are these arrows ? Look ! Are they 
not clean as are the arrows of a boy ? It is so 
lone since their steel heads were driven Into 
flesh. I am a boy myself! When have I 
seen a foe? It is not gray of years upon 

^ As I have said in a previous note, the Nasqnapees 
are noted for the delicateness of their scenting faculty, 
being as a dog is in this respect. Their sense of smell 
is simply marvellous. 



LTNGAVA. 143 

my head. Some other boy in playfulness 
has sprinkled ashes there ! We Nasquapees 
have been asleep. Awake. Remember. Look 
at my breast. That hole will hold a fist. An 
Esquimau stabbed me there. It was that 
day we fought them on the Marguerite. See 
w^here his seal spear pierced. It drove clean 
through. Look at my back. Beneath the 
shoulder blade the head came out. To-mor- 
row in the ranks of death I'll find the dog 
that drove it in, and pay him the old debt." 

And, gathering up his blanket over bosom 
scarred with dreadful wound, he sat him 
down, while round the lowering circle venge- 
ful murmurs ran. 

Then up stood other one. The horns of 
power were on his head. Around his neck 
a string of polar claws gleamed white. One 



144 UNGAVA. 

eye was gone. The other blazed hke coal of 
fire blown hot. The glowing orb he fixed in 
turn on each swarth face in silence. Then 
stretched to fullest length his sinewy arm, 
and spake : 

" Warriors of the North ! Sons of sires 
that lived in the beeinnino- what foe has ever 
seen your backs in battle ? Your blood a 
hundred times has reddened ice on cold Un- 
gava, and fell in battle rain on its coarse 
gravel. We are a thousand knives. One for 
each knife comes on. Upon that field above 
the sounding sea where for a thousand years 
our sires did fight, there will we fight to- 
morrow. Look at my face. Where is my 
other eye ? Whose spear's point bored it 
out ? Look at my breast. You cannot see 
it. It is hidden under scars. Who made 



UNGAVA. 145 

them ? White Wolf, where is your oldest 
son ? His bones are bleaching on the sands 
of Mamelons. I saw him fall beneath the 
axe of Esquimau. His spirit wanders un- 
avenged. • Black Bear, where are your chil- 
dren ? The Esquimau dogs on the flat 
banks of Peribonka ate them. Gray Fox, 
where is your youngest daughter ? She toils 
a slave, beaten by Esquimau whips, at Lab- 
rador. Is the old blood frozen in us ? No. 
It burns like fire in autumn rushes. The 
dead are looking at us. They are bursting 
out of graves to see if we be men. Listen. 
Hear. Their voices call for vengeance. One 
day, give us one day of glorious battle, and 
we will feed the hungry wolves of wild Un- 
gava fat with flesh of Esquimaux." 

So thundered he, and at the closing word 



146 UNGAVA, 

of the maimed warrior, up with a yell the cir- 
cle leapt, and twenty axes lifted high flashed 
gleaming brightly through the cavern's gloom. 

Then on the left of the great chair the 
Chief of Mistassinni rose, tonpfueless, with- 
ered, thin with age, but his old frame, charged 
with electric hate, quivered with life intense, 
while in his head his eyes glowed like a 
panther's, crouching for his spring. Then 
every horny point bristling round the Wiz- 
ard's seat burned brighter, kindling with fiercer 
fires ; and as the cavern filled with whitest 
light, around the swarthy circle ran an awful 
murmur : 

'' The dead have risen ! Old Mistassinni 
from his grave above the Saguenay, coming 
out of dead-land y stands in our council T' 

Then murmur died in silence, while in the 



UNGAVA. 147 

white light stood the old-time chief, and 
signed : 

*' Men who stand straight. Sons of the 
ancient race who once ruled half the world, 
I, tongueless, speak to you in that old language 
which has come to you from the beginning. 
I am a chief of other days. Your fathers 
knew me. I was their friend, and in their 
aid have fought upon the sands of wild Un- 
gava here, while you were yet unborn. You 
know my fame, for it filled all the north. 
Above the Saguenay I stood the test.' I 
was at torture stake. An Esquimau tore my 
tongue from out my mouth, and ate it. Then 
lighted he the fagots. I did not die. Behold, 
he who sits there — a man without a cross, 

1 An expression used by an Indian to state that he 
has stood the torture of the torture stake, 



148 UNGAVA. 

white as your God, but red as bravest chief 
at heart — did rescue me. I Hved, and ever 
since have waited for my day and chance. 
To-morrow I will fight with you. Your 
Prophet, he who seeth all in living-land or 
dead-land, has said that with the Esquimaux 
my foe is coming. It is well. In battle shall 
I die, and leaving dead upon the sands my 
hated foe, I, joyful, will take trail which leads 
me to my sires. Sons of those with whom in 
other days I fought ; men who stand straight ; 
children of that old race that once ruled half 
the world ; I, of Mistassinni, will fight the 
Esquimaux with you to-morrow. I have said." 
So spake the tongueless chief in stately 
language of old days, the vivid speech of pan- 
tomime, — that quick and universal tongue of 
ancient races : and as he sat, the warrior circle 



UNGAVA. I4Q 

rose and facing toward the aged man who had 
been friend and ally of their sires ere they were 
born, each warrior, hand on breast, bowed low 
in stately courtesy to the ground. 

Then, after pause, the Trapper rose ; and 
every eye in the dark circle fixed itself in 
admiration on his mighty frame. 

" Men of the North," he said, '' your fame 
is known to me. My name, perhaps, is known 
to you. I am the friend of yonder aged chief, 
and was the friend of him whose bosom bore 
the Tortoise sign, who stemmed the bloody 
tide with you at Mamelons in that dread fio-ht 
which God by darkness stopped.' I am John 
Norton." 

^ Referring to the dreadful fight at the mouth of the 
Saguenay, which the earthquake finally stopped. (See 
the Doom of Mamelons.) 



150 UA^GAVA. 

Then out of every mouth there burst a cry 
of wonder and applause. Each swarthy hand 
dashed upward, pahn outward, unto him, and 
every feathered head bowed to the cavern's 
floor. Then spake he farther : 

*' I have come northward with the Chief to 
see him fight last fight, and prove my love for 
him by doing as he bids. No greater proof 
has love than that to give. To-morrow he 
will find among the Esquimaux his foe. You 
are the sons of sires who never, beaten, left 
a bloody field, and need no help from me. I 
will stand by and see the old Chief has fair 
fight. So has he bidden and so will I do. I 
am his friend, and with him keep I word and 
bond. I have said." And, as he closed, a 
murmur of assent ran round the circle 
dark. 



UNGAVA. 151 

Then from his chair the Wizard spake, and 
as he spake the hghts burned fading down, 
and at the closing word the chamber filled 
with gloom : 

" My children, I, your Prophet, High Priest 
of that old race which once ruled half the 
world, of which you are. Ancient of Days, 
speak words of Fate. To-morrow you shall 
fight and win. The Chief of Mistassinni 
shall find foe and chance. In dying he shall 
put the Trapper under word and bond, and 
you shall see such fight as never yet was 
seen on wild Ungava, where fights have been 
for twice a thousand years. Northward the 
Esquimaux shall never march again. My hour 
has almost come. Soon shall I rise, as all my 
line have risen after many years, into the skies, 
not knowinor death. None of our Caste has 



152 UNGAVA. 

ever entered grave. God takes us.' Ungava 
will go westward to that lake to which of old 
the White God came. You shall not see her 
ever more. The race that was with ours in 
the beginning has died, and ours is dying. 
Fate has it so, and who may alter fate ! But 
make the sunset of my going glorious. To- 
morrow fight as you nor any ever fought 
before, that I may feel the pride of ancient 
days and bear with me a glorious message 
to your sires as I join them in the skies be- 
yond the northern fires. I, Seer and Prophet, 
Ancient of Days, have spoken. Go." 

And, as he ceased, the lights died out, and 
through the gloom was heard the sound of 
softly going feet. 

^ Genesis v. 24. — And Enoch was not, because God 
took him. 



UNGAVA. 153 

Next day beheld die lines of batde set. A 
thousand on each side, they stretched across 
the plain on which a hundred fights had been 
in other days. On graves where slept their 
sires, the living stood, ready to die. Then 
joined the battle. The hostile lines in charg- 
ing columns met, and out of wear's red mouth 
an awful bellowing poured. Amid the Nas- 
quapees, upon the left, the tongueless Chief 
of Mistassinni fought. Gray, withered, dumb, 
he seemed a warrior out of dead-land. He 
spake no word ; from mouth no yell of tri- 
umph came, nor order ; but silently he killed. 
The Esquimaux before the dreadful apparition 
fled. They cried: "The dead have risen! 
who can the dead withstand ! " and ran. 

Upon the right, heading the Esquimaux, 
another ancient warrior, gray, withered, dumb, 



T54 UNGAVA. 

fought in same dreadful style. The Nasqua- 
pees, affrighted at the awful sight, fled crying : 
"The dead have risen! This is no living war- 
rior ; — who can the dead withstand ! " Thus 
either end of battle line bent backward and 
gave way before the ghostly sight. 

Then to the Chief of Mistassinni a wounded 
warrior ran, and cried : "On the far right a 
warrior risen out of erave is drivinsf all before 
him. Come and help." And to the Esqui- 
maux there came a runner, running as for 
life, and said : " Come to the other end of 
battle, for out of death has come a chief of 
ancient days who driveth all before him." 
And thus the two old chiefs, who long had 
waited for this day of vengeance, came hurry- 
ing toward each other, and, midway between 
the scattered wings, met face to face, at last ! 



UNGAVA. 155 

So did the two old apparitions stand mid- 
way betwixt the hnes, grim, silent, glaring at 
each other, gathering strength for battle unto 
death. And all the war grew silent as the 
two, and stood at rest, waiting to see the 
awful fight begin. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

DUEL OF THE OLD DUMB CHIEFS. 

'T^HEN each his hatchet threw, and all the 
"■■ might of their old withered arms went 
with the deadly cast. The bright blades 
whirling on met in mid flight, and steel and 
handles shivered at the shock like glass. 
Then up from either line of faces battle- 
painted, ochred in panoply of death, rose a 
shrill yell as the war hatchets shivered, — a 
sight no warrior standing there had ever seen 
before, though some were gray in war and 
scarred with half a hundred battles. But on 
the heel of that wild yell of thoughtless rage 

and pride, the prophets of each tribe sent 

156 



UNGAVA. 157 

forth a wail, low, wild, and long as is the cry 
of crouching, shivering hound above the dying 
hunter, — dying in the snow. For well they 
read the sign, and knew that never yet had 
warriors lived w^iose axes met midway be- 
tween their heads and shivered in the air. 

Then the . two aged, tongueless foes drew 
bow and loosened quiver, and quick as light- 
ning's flash set shaft to tightened string. 
The air between them on the instant thick- 
ened with flying shafts ; the rounded shields 
of walrus hide, hung from their necks above 
each shrivelled breast, rang like two anvils 
tapped by falling hammers as the steel-headed 
arrows smote them. So rained and rano^ the 
bolts of death upon the two opposing shields, 
and, when the sheafs were spent, their tawny, 
shrunken arms and shoulders were cut and 



1^8 l/NGAVA. 

pierced with gashes red and deep, and blood 
fell downward from their wounds as fall the 
first drops from a cloud before the thunder 
rolls ; while at their feet the feathers from 
the broken shafts lay thick as plumage in a 
glade above whose turf two hungry, hunting 
eagles, swooping at one prey, have met in 
mad and disappointed swoop, and clinched. 
But by no bolt had either shield been pierced, 
and underneath the tough, protecting hides 
their old mad hearts, untouched, beat, hating, 
on. 

Then rose a mighty murmur, and each line 
of batde, forgetful of its hate, swayed in 
around the fighters ; for never on wild Un- 
gava's stormy shore, where bloody war had 
been for twice a thousand years, had there 
been seen by mortal eyes such dreadful fight 



UNGAVA. 159 

before. It was as if these two old chiefs had 
burst their cerements of bark and risen out 
of graves, shrivelled, dried, death-dumb, to 
fight, and show the younger men that gazed, 
how their old grandsires fought it out. The 
Trapper, leaning on his rifle not ten paces 
off, saw in the gloomy orbs of the old Chief 
the death light shine, and knew that this was 
his last battle. Thrice lifted he his rifle butt 
from sand, then drove it back. Thrice did his 
mighty fingers seek hatchet handle, then fall 
away, and with a groan he said : • 

" Nay. Nay. It may not be. It is a 
mighty fight and fair. My God ! it must go 
on ! But his old eyes will never gaze again 
on the loved rocks of Mistassinni ! " 

Thus mingled were both wars. The Es- 
quimau stood side by side with hated Nas- 



l6o l/NGAVA. 

quapee. Their painted faces almost touched 
as they stood thronged around the dreadful 
two whose hearts were hot with hate kindled 
in old fights fought on those barren shores 
before the warriors round them had been 
born. 

Then the two fighters, grim and gray, wnth 
stately motion lifted their old hands, palm 
outw^ard, and called mutual truce. Then sig- 
nalled the gray Esquimau in dumb show to 
his tribe : 

'' My children, here fight I my last fight. 
My fathers call me, and I go. The trail has 
waited long and I must tread it now. This 
chief and I have met before. With this rieht 
hand I tore his tono-ue from out his mouth. 
Lying half smothered in the brands, his hand 
launched knife at me, which passing through 



UNGAVA. l6l 

my face made my mouth dumb forever. We 
both have wrongs to right, and we will right 
them here. Take ye my body to that bold 
bluff where all my fathers sleep abreast of 
Anticosti. Lay me with them there where 
I may hear the tides come roaring in, and 
see the seals at play. Let there be wail 
for me as for an old-time chief among the 
tents which empty stand and will stand 
empty ever more beside the sea whose moan 
shall sound forever for a race forever gone. 
From this last field of mine bring into Spirit- 
Land such news of deeds and death as shall 
make welcome for you such as warriors give 
and get around those spirit fires which light 
the lodges of our sires beyond the northern 
sky. I, dying, give cheer to you about to die. 
So fare you well." 



1 62 UNGAVA. 

Then to the Trapper signalled his dumb 
friend : 

" Trapper, the trail is ready and I go. This 
Esquimau and I will end our quarrel here. 
The trail is long and lonely, but never yet 
hast thou failed dying man. I love thee, 
Trapper, for thou art true. No white is in 
thee. Thou art red. I shall not see thee 
ever after this. Thy trail runs to the front 
of Ada's throne ; mine to my father's lodge. 
Tell her from me, that he who made her 
grave at Mamelons sent greeting to her when 
he died. Take thou my body to far Mistas- 
sinni and lay it in that cave where sleep my 
sires and where forever sound the voices of 
the dead. When we have ended this, let 
these damned Esquimaux feel thy rifle butt 
and knife. At sunset, out of this last fray 



UNGAVA. 163 

of mine, let both come forth well wet with 
brains and blood. It is my last behest. I 
love thee, Trapper, like 'a chief. So give me 
word and bond. May no knife ever girdle 
head of thine. So fare thee well." 

Then spake the Trapper : 

*' Old friend, as thou hast said, so shall it 
be, if life holds with me after this. Thy 
greeting will I give her when we meet. 
Thy body will I bear to Mistassinni, and, 
in the cave where sleep thy sires and 
where their voices sound forever, there shall 
it sleep. These dogs of Esquimaux shall 
feel my rifle butt and knife. From this last 
fray of thine they shall come forth both red 
and wet. I eive thee w^ord and bond. So 
lay on, Chief, and make thy vengeance sure. 
Thy heaven may not be mine ; and so I 



1 64 UNGAVA. 

say my long farewell, and give thee dying 
cheer." 

Then once again die old gray haters faced, 
and their throats rattled, struggling with wild 
yells. Their sunken eyes glowed hot as 
burning coals. They dashed their shields to 
earth and stooped low down. Then drew 
their knives, long, bright, and keenly edged ; 
sprang into air and met, — and struck. Each 
knife drove, heart-deep, home ; and, as they 
fell apart, each bosom held the other's blade 
sunk 'twixt the ribs to the strong handle. So 
they died. 

Then for a space was silence. Deep as 
death's, it hung above the host and stayed 
the pulses of the air. Then into it and 
through it, swelling slowly up and wavering 
on, the Indian wail arose, wild and weird, the 



UNGAVA. 165 

saddest of all wailing ever sounded out of 
throat of woe. Quavering it swelled, lingered 
in long plaint, then died away in thinnest 
sound, and all the bloody plain was silent as 
the grave again. Then, suddenly, like crash 
of thunder in the breathless pause of some 
hot summer night, there burst a yell that 
ripped the silence into fragments. It burst 
from out a thousand throats as if the thousand 
had been joined in one, and through it hell 
had sent from out her caves its scream of 
hottest hate. Then deadly strife went down 
and rioted among them. Mixed and jammed 
they were together. Each man found foe be- 
side him. No room for arrow or for spear 
was there. Each hand set fingers into near- 
est throat until their nails in torn flesh met. 
Then knives were plucked and reddened to 



t66 ungava. 

the handles as they found flesh, and half the 
battle in the sand lay colled and knotted like 
a field of snakes. So wrestled they and clung, 
bit, struck, and died. 

When rose the signal yell the Trapper's 
rifle cracked. Both barrels rane almost in 
twin report and two tall chiefs sank brainless 
to the sand. Then, swinging heavy hatchet 
in mighty hand, into the jammed battle did he, 
headlong, plunge. Half through the thick- 
ened throng of fighting men he hewed his 
way. Through lifted shield his red axe sank 
to covered head and clove to shattered jaw. 
The warding spear shaft, gnarled and thick, 
shivered like rod of glass beneath his dread- 
ful stroke. He warded neither knife nor 
spear. The terror of his arm was his de- 
fence. In his red wake the Nasquapees 



UNGAVA. 167 

rushed in. They guarded safe and sure the 
back of dieir great friend. He knew it not. 
He only saw his thickening foes in front, and 
strode straip-ht on. He o^rew in raee as o-rew 
the fight. In him war stood incarnate, fierce 
and red. The ancient dead foueht in him. 
For o'er his head he heard the steady tramp 
of feet, and through the air the old Iberian 
murmurs run. And 'mid the whiz of arrows, 
whir of hatchets, crash of axes, and the thug 
of spears as they were driven home, he heard 
a voice he knew cry clear and loud : 

*' Lay on, John Norton, lay thou on ! For 
the old Tortoise's sake, — whose son thou art, 
and king shalt be, — show thy full strength 
this day and make good her right to name 
thee lord and master to the mighty warriors 
of her race, now gazing at thee, under lifted 



1 68 UNGAVA. 

shields above Ungava. Lay on, I say, for 
tribal siQ^n and her ! " 

Then he went wild. He cast his dreadful 
axe in air, and, clutching rifle by the muzzle, 
drove headlong at them. His mighty face, 
lean-featured, rigid, battle-white, sharp-set as 
flint edged for the pan, was horrible to see. 
His great, gray eyes, beneath his shaggy 
brows, were black as night, in whose black 
centre lightnings burn and blaze. 

From left to right — a mighty sweep — his 
heavy rifle swept. Stock, locks, and wood- 
work shivered as he struck, and flew in splin- 
ters wide cast. Around him centred all the 
battle. He was the battle. Ahead of him 
the Esquimaux rallied thick as bees in bush, 
when some intruding shock has burst the hive, 
and inner comb and dome of gray lie on the 



UNGAVA. ' 169 

ground in patches. Through buckskin shirt and 
jacket stout their pelting arrows stung. They 
spotted him with blood. He felt no smart nor 
sting, but like a maddened lion ramped on. 
In Esquimaux no coward blood e'er flowed. 
They are a hardy stock, and all their lives 
are lived in peril. They breasted bravely up 
against him by the score, their coarse hair 
bristling and their small eyes adder-red. On 
shoulders broad and stout, on thickened skull 
and wide breast-bone, the bevelled barrels fell 
and crushed. He smote them down as thresh- 
er's flail beats banded bundles on thresh- 
ing-floor. With every stroke his breathing 
sounded wide. So fought he, and so they, 
quivering, died. 

Then into the wild battle ran a figure 
clothed in black. At waist a tasselled cord 



170 UNGAVA. 

was tied. His head was shaven bare. In 
high upHfted hand a silver crucifix gleamed 
white. Upon a pile of dead men, tumbled 
like jammed logs, — a dreadful heap of death, 
— the holy friar leaped and held high the sign 
of Calvary. Then Nasquapees and Esqui- 
maux dropped on their knees and flung their 
weapons down. They knelt to Heaven's sign. 
With steady hand the holy man held silver 
cross on high, and to the dreadful slayer 
called : 

" Stay hand ! Stay hand, thou dreadful 
man ! For Holy Mary's sake and her dear 
Son's, stay now thy bloody hand ! Above 
this awful field I lift this sacred sign and bid 
this strife to cease. Let these poor men that 
live, go free." 

Then stood the Trapper. From dripping 



UNGAVA. 171 

brow the battle sweat he wiped with one red 
hand, and, gripping hard the bloody and bent 
barrels in the other, said : 

" In yonder dell the tongueless Chief of 
Mistassinni lieth dead. Between his ribs the 
driven knife still clings. In fair and mighty 
battle did he die. I was his friend. He 
knew his doom and bade me long farewell. 
He loved me like a chief, and therefore 
charged me, under word and bond, that I 
come forth from this last fray of his with rifle 
butt and knife well wet and red with brains 
and blood. I gave him word and bond, and 
joyfully he took the trail that led him to his 
sires. 

*' Bond and word have I kept on this full 
field. Above the dead and dying thou hast 
lifted sacred sign. I am a Christian man. 



172 UJVGAVA. 

Let, therefore, these damned dogs go hence 
aHve. They owe me rifle, — barrels, stock 
and locks, and hatchet flung high up, when 
in the air I heard her old-time people's war 
cries ring, and caught the sound of charging 
feet above my head. I will collect my debt 
upon them on some other day. Aye, let the 
dogs go hence. I am a Christian man." 

So spake he. Then turned his back on 
priest and living foe, and, lining steps by the 
long row of bodies he had smitten down 
through bloody lane made by his awful rage, 
he came to where the silent Chief of Mistas- 
sinni lay silent evermore. 

But when he came to where the old Chief 
lay, he started, for lo ! amid the dead, robed 
in black furs from head to foot, a hood of 
night's jet blackness on her head, her ser- 



UNGA VA. I >]i 

pent wand of twisted gold in hand, her face 
white as the snow, her great orbs fixed in 
mournful gloom upon the dead man's face, 
his withered hand in hers, there sat Ungaval 

Then spake he, as he stood all dripping 
red, the wrath of battle in his blood and half 
its fierceness blazing in his eye. 

'' Never on battle plain did I see dead so 
thick ! I would that his old eyes had seen 
a man without a cross keep word and bond. 
This was last fray of his, and had he lived to 
see it fouehten out, he would have had a 
tale to tell the chiefs he met as he burst 
Into Spirit- Land that would have sent their 
hatchets whirling high In air as they gave war- 
rior's welcome. Thou hast seen either world, 
but did'st thou ever see such fight before, in 
living-land or dead-land, Ungava ? " 



! 74 UNGA VA. 

Then she made answer. Sitting by the 
dead amid the dead, and Hfting eyes of gloom 
to his great face, she said : 

'' Fights many have I seen on sand and 
ice beneath a sun that neither set nor rose, 
and under Hghts no mortal hand e'er kindled 
in the North, which burned the unseen, 
rounded end of the world, — but never such 
a fight as this. Above you, as you onward 
hewed your .way, the old-time dead stood 
thick as sedge at edge of salted streams in 
summer. Some were of my red race, for 
they waved hatchets over head, and on their 
naked bosoms, crimsoned bright, I saw the 
Tortoise sign. I knew the Totem, for often 
have I seen it on the breast of him, your 
friend, who saved the fight on the flat banks 
of Peribonka, where my father died. But 



UNGAVA. 175 

Others did I see, more vast of limb and huge; 
a giant throng, tall, big-breasted, lofty as 
pines, who, under oval shields bright as the 
sun, pure gold, their edges lifted high, gazed 
at you as you hewed on. And when, at last, 
thou did'st cast hatchet high in air, and, bare- 
headed, without guard, did'st beat them down 
with heavy rifle clubbed, and all its stock and 
polished woodwork into splinters flew, their 
mighty swords on golden shields did clash 
and such a roar went up as never lifted air 
of either world before. O dreadful man, it 
was a dreadful fight, and long and wild will 
rise the wail from maid and wife in the skin 
tents of Labrador, when from the North there 
shall be bruited down from tribe to tribe the 
tidings of this fray on far Ungava. God 
grant thee mercy. Trapper, when in hour of 



176 UA'GAVA. 

need he reckons with thee for this dreadful 
day." 

''So be it," gravely answered he, '' God 
grant me mercy full and sure for sin done 
here or anywhere, when in my hour of need 
he reckons with me for this fray or other 
red ones I have fought in. Thou art a girl, 
Uneava, and can'st not understand a war- 
rior's soul in battle. I did give word and 
bond to this old chie^ my friend, who for 
the length of warrior's life had walked the 
vocal world of God with silent mouth, shut 
off from all he loved and lived for by the 
great wrong done to him at the stake by the 
damned Esquimaux. Through savage circle, 
as they tortured, did I break when blazed the 
fire they lighted round him. This foot it was 
that cast the fagots wide, when, from the 



UNGAVA. 177 

thongs cut by my knife, he fell headlong- 
among them. For thirty years he lived seek- 
ing this day, his foe and chance. Foe and 
chance did he find on this far field, and 
mighty battle did he make, though age had 
whitened head and shrivelled hand. Here, 
dying, did he put me under bond to right 
the wrong which he had borne for half a life. 
So stood the matter. I fought for friendship 
and for right, and God will grant me mercy, 
if, in battle fiercely set, I did in wrath- strike 
one red blow too heavy or too many. So let 
it rest until I come to where the scales are 
poised for warriors and for wrongs righted in 
battle. I will bide issue like a Christian man, 
not doubting. Now will I lift this withered 
frame that once held mighty soul, and bear 
it to the cave where you shall fit it for long 



lyg UNGAVA. 

journey toward the grave which waits its com- 
ing at Mistassinni. For there, in that dread 
cave where all his fathers sleep and where 
he will sleep the last of all thus chambered, 
must this old frame be laid : that cave 
whose fame fills all the North, whose cav- 
erned passages, as you know, are filled for- 
ever with the voices and the murmurs of the 
dead. 

" So now, old friend, on back of him who 
keepeth word and bond, from thy last field 
and fray thou shalt be borne. A heavier bur- 
den I have often carried, but never sadder. 
Ah me ! ah me ! the dead grow fast and 
friends grow few as life's swift days fly on ! 
The Queen died on my breast. The Chief 
is dead. At Mamelons my sweet love sleeps. 
And now full half a thousand miles I go with 



UN CAVA. 179 

him who made her grave, to his own grave 
at Mistassinni. Ungava, white of face but 
dark of soul, die not, lest out of that old 
cave in the Great Rock I shall come forth 
into an empty world." 

Then tenderly the empty frame which once 
held mighty soul he lifted on his shoulders 
broad, and, casting one long look across the 
field whose fame would be his own till all 
the tribes died out, he went up toward the 
Conjurer's cave which stood on the high cliff 
at whose worn base the great tides rush and 
roar. Him toiling on, Ungava followed, white 
of face but dark of soul, whose birth was out 
of mystery and under doom ; whose magic 
was the wonder of the North ; whose voice 
the dead obeyed ; whose touch might heal 
or kill ; whose 'serpent wand of gold was like 



l8o UNGAVA. 

that rod that Aaron cast at Egypt's feet ; and 
with her in the cave he left the dead, that 
she, with strange preserving force, might 
make it fit for distant journey to its distant 
grave. 



CHAPTER IX. 

THE fairies' farewell TO UNGAVA. 

'^q^ RAPPER, behold the whiteness of the 
world. How still it lies, like angel 
sleeping on a couch of down plucked from 
the white swan's breast. See how the moon 
wheels up her rounded orb from out the 
eastern sea, which whitens at her touch to 
her own beauty. The waves roll pearly pale 
and fling their spray in silvery showers far 
up the gleaming cliffs. The snow is whiter 
as her beams fall on it, and yonder icy 
islands shine like mirrors as they meet her 
face turned full upon them. All things are 
seen in distance, softly dim as some loved 



1 82 L/NGAVA. 

face that gazes at us in our dreams, through 
the gauze curtains which hang but for an 
hour between us, dreaming, and the spirit 
world ; soon to be softly drawn aside for our 
own entrance within that peaceful realm 
where wait the angels, once our friends. 
Hark ! to the low, soft note of mother-seals 
calling with sweet interrogation to their 
babes, safely sleeping in the crystal crevices 
of the ice. Was ever scene more peaceful ? " 
" It is, indeed, a peaceful scene, Ungava," 
replied the Trapper, ''but barren to the eye 
of one who loves the stir of life, the motion 
of the world's activity, the busy hum of 
going and of coming, and the glow of human 
happiness. If one could people this pale 
realm with buoyant motion ; set this still air 
to music and make the moonlight dance, 



UNGAVA. 183 

then might he say in truth it were a perfect 
world produced by magic." 

'' O, thou of bhnded eyes ! " Ungava 
cried. '' I did forget thou could'st not see, 
save as the orbed sentinels on guard beneath 
the arches of thy beetling brows imperfectly 
report to thee. What, then, if I should give 
thee sight which brings the unseen world with- 
in my vision, and thou should'st see the Fairies, 
Sprites, and Elves, the Gnomes and Witches, 
which people all this winter world, above, 
around, and underneath us, with frolic and 
with pleasure, as they hold nightly festival. 
Would such a sight please thee ? " 

''Thou art in joking mood," returned the 
Trapper, smiling. ''There are no Fairies in 
the world ; that is the faith of children." 

" Children are wiser than the older folk, 



184 UNGAVA. 

John Norton," returned Ungava, seriously. 
'* They come as spirits out of spirit-land, 
and, taking forms of flesh, are subject to its 
limitations. O Trapper, this earthly form 
in which we live, is but imprisonment ; bond- 
age to eyes which otherwise might see, and 
mask to our real faces. Through flesh we 
only show ourselves in glimpses. And the 
fond faith of children in the marvellous, to 
which they cling, is but the struggling of 
their souls against forgetfulness of that bright, 
animated world from which they came. 
And those who laugh at them, because of 
their sweet credence, are like those blinded 
ones — the Gnomes of under-earth — who, 
born in blindness, beyond the reach of light, 
lauo-h at our stories of the sun, and smile at 
us who do put faith in stars. Would'st thou 



UNGAVA. 185 

have eyes for once, O Trapper, and see 
what thou do'st laugh at ? " 

"■ My eyes are fairly good," replied he, 
laughingly. *' But if thou can'st give bet- 
ter to me, then, let them come, Ungava." 

*' Nay, nay, thou sceptic," answered she, 
** I may not give thee eyes to see what is 
beyond thy ken at present ; but I can com- 
mand the spirits of the earth and air to take 
such form as shall upon the lenses of thine 
eyes cast full reflection, and so become ob- 
jective to thy senses. They are compliant to 
me. Shall I call?" 

'*Aye, call, Ungava, call. If childhood's 
faith in spirits by any chance be real, I 
would be child again," he answered, smiling. 

Then, as she stood, Ungava lifted wand, 
and suddenly around the two there grew a 



1 86 l/NGAVA, 

light far whiter than the moon. It came as 
dawn and day would come which had no 
flush of color. So came It round them as 
they stood upon the cliff above the lighted 
sea which darkened with the contrast. So 
standing In the whiteness, Ungava called : 

" Come, Spirit and Sprite, 

Come laughing and dancing ; 
Come out of the night, 

To this white light come glancing. 
Come, Elfin and Fairy ; 

I form ring of magic ; 
Come sing us some song. 

Come dance us some dances. 

" Come from sea and from land, 

F'rom deep earth and high heaven. 
See, I Hft now my hand. 
The signal is given. 



UNGAVA. 187 

From the fires of the North, 

From the foam of the sea, 
From your caves now come forth 

And appear unto me ! " 

Then, slowly, from a mound of snow that 
lifted dome of whiteness near to where they 
stood, a form of beauty did arise, clothed in 
soft vestments woven from whitest fleece and 
edged with fur of ermine. So into sight she 
rose, and with her other ones of equal beauty 
came and, standing in the brilliance, sang : 

I. 

'* I am Queen of the Snow, of the pure white 
snow. 
I eddy and circle and whirl as I go. 
I am Child of the Frost. I am born above 

mountains ; 
I mantle the forest ; I cover the fountains. 



1 88 UA^GAVA. 

I waver and fall, I stream and I flow, 
With the currents of wind. I am beautiful 
snow ! 

CHORUS. 

" She is Queen of the Snow, of the pure white 

snow. 
We flakes are her subjects : we whirl as we go ; 
We eddy and circle ; we stream and we flow. 
She is Child of the Frost. She is beautiful 

snow ! 

II. 

" When flowers are all withered, and their fra- 
grance is fled ; 

When the wild grape is fallen, and the green 
leaf is dead ; 

When out of the forest the song-birds are 
flown, 

And the harvest is reaped from the seed that 
was sown ; 



UiVGAVA. 189 

Then, then, from the sky to the earth far below 
I come down in mercy. I am beautiful snow. 

CHORUS. 

/' When flowers are all withered, and their fra- 
. grance is fled ; 
When the wild grape is fallen, and the green 

leaf is dead ; 
Then, then, from the sky to the earth far below 
She comes down in mercy. She is beautiful 
snow ! " 

So sang the elfin ones and vanished, and 
the white silence softly lay unoccupied on 
cliff and sea and shinofled shore. 

" Call yet again," the Trapper cried. " Call 
yet again, Ungava ; for never yet did mortal 
eyes see sight so sweet, or mortal ears hear 
sweeter song." 



IQO UNGAVA. 

Then lifted she her wand once more, and 
waved it to and fro as one who beckoning 
calls. And as the wand in easy circles 
moved, she, smiling, sang : 

" Come, lily so white, 
Come out of the night. 
Come, rose-tree so red, 
Bring wreath for my head. 
Let the odor of hill, 

Let the flower of the street. 
Let the Spirits of bloom 

Gather here to my feet." 

Then, even as she sang, out of the earth 
there slowly rose a soft green lobe of mon- 
strous size, and opening, lo ! The Spirit of 
the Lilies, In Its yellow heart stood forth 
revealed, — then sang : 



UNGAVA. 191 



I. 

"Have you breathed me by night, when on the 

still air 
Came the song of the lute, came the murmur of 

prayer ? 
Have you breathed me at morn, when the odor- 
ous trees 
Were thrilled from their sleep by the kiss of the 

breeze ? 
Have you breathed me when mingled with mine 

was the breath 
Of the woman you loved, and must love till 

death, 
As her lips clung to yours, their caress to bestow, 
While I lifted and sank on her bosom of snow ? 
If you have, then you know that no other such 

bloom 
Blows for man or for woman 'twixt cradle and 

tomb. 



192 



UNGA VA, 



11. 

'* Oh, for love and for lovers my perfume is 

shed. 
I am flower of the living, I am flower of the 

dead. 
At the feasts of the rich, by the lovely and 

fair, 
I am grouped in the cups, I am twined in the 

hair. 
By the hand of the groom, ere he sleeps by her 

side. 
My white leaves are sown on the couch of the 

bride. 
And if she be taken, on the door of her tomb. 
As a sign and a symbol, he chisels my bloom. 
Oh, for love and for lovers, not since the sweet 

air 
Has been breathed with their sighs has there 

been flower so fair. 



UNGA VA. 



193 



III. 

"I am old as the world. When the Stars of the 
morn 

Sang together for joy, for their joy I was born. 

In the dawn of the world, when women were 
given 

In their sweetness to men, I was dropped down 
from heaven, 

To be charm for their charms, and a potion, for 
never 

Did a lover love once, and not love forever, 

The woman that wore me on her bosom the 
night 

When he knelt at her feet in love's wild de- 
light. 

Oh, for love and for lovers, not since the sweet 

air 
Has been breathed with their sighs has there 

been flower so fair. 



194 UNGAVA. 

IV. 

" When the Sons of God chose from the daughters 

of men 
The sweetest and fairest to be wives to them, 

then 
Thy race did begin. When thy first mother was 

wed, 
The stars were made floral to be wreath for her 

head. 
Since then I have come, both for bridal and 

bier, 
When wand has been lifted, or song sung to 

appear. 
Ungava, Ungava, am I needed as breath 
In the sweetness of life, or the faintness of death } 
Oh, tell me, for ne'er since thy race breathed the 

air 
For love and for lovers has there been flower 

so fair." 



UNGAVA. 195 

Then silence ; and in it lingered long the 
dying strain, sinking as sinks at death, per- 
haps, our memory of other days, which we 
in dying leave regretfully, so sweet they were 
to us in living, filled to the brim like jocund 
cup with wit and laughter and love's sw^eet 
wine. Then, strangest sight that magic 
ever gave to wondering mortals, — around 
the two, on that high cliff, there spread a 
lawn of emerald, dewy and fresh, in 
which were floral mounds and clumps of 
roses whose wealth of bloom weighed the 
strong bushes down ; and hedges fenced it 
in whose every twig was odorous, and 
every bush and bloom and leaf was vital. 
For from this forest sweet a group of fairy, 
elfin forms, each garlanded with her own 
flower, came gliding forth and made obe- 



iq5 ungava. 

dience to Ungava. Then, standing round 

her, sang: 

I. 

"Queen of our hearts, by stream and hill, 

We heard thy magic summons thrill. 

Queen of our hearts, in bower and hall, 

We caught the sweetness of thy call. 

From Southern pool and stream afar, 

We, guided by the Northern Star, 

Have come our homage here to give, — 

For thee we live ! For thee we live ! 

II. 

" Last of that race, whose bridal morn 
Was ushered in when we were born ; 
Last of that race to which we gave, 
To sweeten bridal bed and grave, 
Our sweetest breath, our fullest bloom ; 
And laid on cradle and on tomb. 
The richest offering we could wreathe, — 
For thee we breathe ! For thee we breathe ! 



UNGAVA. 

III. 

" Last of thy race ! thy eyes of night 
Hold in their depths the farther sight. 
We are of earth, and may not know 
The feeling in thy breast of snow. 
We wait thy will. We do not dare 
To crown thy head, to wreath thy hair, 
Nor garland waist with bridal zone. 
Still do we live for thee alone. 



IV. 

" Last of thy race ! perchance 'twill be, 
That we thy face no more shall see. 
At Mamelons, on breast of snow, 
A snow-white lily lieth low ; 
There on that dreadful hill of fate 
Sweet Atla saw her morning break ; 
But know, in life or death, that we 
Still breathe for thee ! Still breathe for thee ! 



197 



198 UNGAVA. 

Then died the tender strain, and singers 
faded with the song, and once again the 
white silence softly lay unoccupied on cliff 
and sea and shingled shore. Then she, as 
waking out of trance, raised eyes of tender 
gloom to his and said : 

"Trapper, behold the sky! What eye 
may count the stars which to the thought- 
ful soul do punctuate its spaces with interro- 
gations ? Can'st thou believe that all those 
shining points which powder it with golden 
dust are worlds, inhabited like ours ? See 
how the o'erarching dome is all bespangled 
with fretted fire. What noble roofment has 
this little earth thus canopied with glory ! 
Tell me hast thou a star in yonder sky 
which thou do'st call thy own ? A star linked 
with a loved one's face ? " 



UNGAVA. 199 

" Nay, nay, I am not fanciful, Ungava. I 
am a plain, blunt man. I know my friends. 
My foes know me. My loves are simple. I 
am a man of fact, not fancy. I eat my food, 
I quench my thirst. I love my friend. I hate 
my foe. Word and bond keep 1 unto death. 
The rest I leave to God." 

" But, Trapper, lift thou thine eyes again. 
Select some star, distant or nigh, and to it 
link a name — the name of her thou lovest 
over all. Let its bright ray be to thine eyes 
a face, and tell me of her. I would know 
the woman thou do'st love." 

"The woman I do love, Ungava, lives not 
in any star. She lives — I know not where. 
I know not where to find her when I die. I 
only know she loves me with a queenly love; 
and when my eye grows dim and all the 



200 UNGA VA. 

trail fades out, I trust her faithful hand will 
guide me on. I know no further, and I have 
no further hope." 

'' But, Trapper, If th)^ love is dead and 
gone — forever gone — and where she is thou 
knowest not, nor how to find her, nor 
whether you and she shall ever meet. If all 
Is dim, uncertain, dubious, — then thou can'st 
surely love some other one — some fair, sweet 
one, who should give all her soul to thee ; 
be comfort to thy days, and to thy face lift 
eyes of worship because to her thou art as 
God." 

Then said the Trapper, gravely : 

" Ungava, of little loves man may have 

many, born of his vagrant moods or transient 

passions ; for man Is as the earth, and out of 

him, prolific, spring many growths, some sweet, 



UA^GAVA, 20 1 

some foul, which, whether sweet or foul, are 
only of a day, and die. But one great love, 
and only one, may be to man who stands 
large natured and with powers too strong to 
die. Such love is central to him. Rooted in 
his soul it lives with it forever, and all the 
sweetness and the strength of him are in 
it as the sap is in the tree. So flower and 
fruit come from it, and such high ornament 
as make him glorious evermore. Such love 
did come to me, and in my soul I feel it 
growing more and more. One love I have, 
and only one. Another one I may not have, 
nor wish. It fills me as a cup is filled with 
water when its brim is wet. I drink of it, 
and, drinking the sweet draught, I thirst 
not, and I need no more." 

And as he spake, yea, as the words were 



202 UNGA VA. 

on his lips, across the moon there grew a 
cloud, and darkened all the world. Black 
grew the sea, and heaving without cause 
from out the darkness came a moan, and a 
great wave rode in upon the darkness, and 
underneath the cliff broke with a fall that 
shook it ; then, silence. 

Then said Ungava, speaking softly in the 
gloom : 

'' Trapper, thy heart is fixed, and fixed 
too is my fate. Within the cave for seven 
days will I do solemn service. Then enter 
in, and thou shalt find him ready for the 
trail by which his body thou shalt bring to 
Mistassinni. There wilt thou find me by the 
cave that none may enter. There, with the 
mighty of his race and mine, shall he find 
sepulture. I would not change thy stead- 



UNGA VA. ~ 203 

fast soul. It is enough for me as woman 
to have known thee and have loved. Thou 
art of ancient time. To word and bond, 
and nobler yet to love, living or dead, thy 
soul holds true. Long is the trail, but heart 
of truth makes tireless foot. Once more at 
Mistassinni we must meet. There shall we 
come to fate and its sad end. There shall 
we make last parting ; and such parting will 
it be as never on this earth was made before ! 
So fare thee well." 

So said she, and then vanished. Then 
the cloud passed, the moon came forth, and 
on the crest of that high rock above the 
sleeping sea, he stood alone, while the white 
silence once more softly lay unoccupied on 
cliff and sea and shingled shore. And as he 
through the solemn silence slowly downward 



204 UNGAVA. 

went he murmured to himself: "Die not, 
Ungava, lest from that cave in the Great 
Rock I shall come forth into an empty world. 
Alas ! Alas ! I would my feet might never 
tread the trail that leads to Mistassinni." 



